Fresh

So the semester officially starts tomorrow, at 8AM. With Biochemistry. Like the previous semester, I'll be doing things a little differently this time around. Primarily, I plan to shave this week. I'll take a few before and after pictures hopefully so you, my groupies, can see the change.

I also plan on blogging more, hopefully. As most of you can see, the layout of the blog has changed a bit. I don't really like the color scheme with the theme. Personally, I'd prefer a grayer feel to it, but we'll see how it turns out.

In addition, if you frequent the gym, you might be surprised to find me there. I have developed quite the muffin top and plan on bringing it back down. I peaked around 188 pounds over break, and as proud as I was about my new high, I can't but help to think that it is a result of sloth, a vice I need to vanquish.

Alliteration aside, I am also going to be active in AXΣ, my chemistry fraternity. Hopefully I can get a little, but if not, it should still be fun. All this change has little to do with the New Year. As some of you know, I detest New Year's resolutions because I think if you want to change something about yourself, it should be at any moment, not shelved until imaginary forces compel you.

After all, shitmydadsays sums it up perfectly:

"Universe is 14 billion years old. Seems silly to celebrate one year. Be like having a fucking parade every time i take a piss."

Memories Consume, Like Opening the Wound

I'm picking me apart again.

I was reading over some of my older posts. I realized that I've grown more self-conscious in my writing. I used to update less frequently, and I think I'm falling into that old habit again.

Or am I breaking the habit of blogging? idecay. Via Eric Woo.

It's difficult to blog in the summer because for me, blogging is something I do when I have things to say, when the gritty gears of my mind are turning. Since summer began, even though I study most days, I don't seem to have as much on my mind. It's possibly the result of summer, or maybe I just don't have as much on my mind like I pretend to have.

I would say that I blog less often because I enjoy my life more now, but I don't think that's true. I don't really feel any happier now than I have before. My life is just bland right now.

A bland life doesn't necessarily imply an unhappy life either. People associate blandness and the neutrality of life with stagnance, like still water that collects debris and mud. I don't think it works like that. Life doesn't need to be exciting all the time. It doesn't need to be brimming with adventure or teeming with activity. Life just needs to be purposeful.

So I guess I'm okay with the way things are for me right now. There isn't the hullabaloo of college life or living with my friends, but as much as I love that, I've come to terms with living in whatever situation I happen to occupy.

I blog less because maybe I'm living more. I'm not necessarily doing more things, just things I didn't think I'd be doing.

Like playing Settlers of Catan.

Or SimCity.

Or eating at Red Robin twice a week. (Actually, not anymore. It's not easy on the wallet.)

This wasn't my vision of my summer, but it's better that I don't know all the details of my future, even though I think about those details frequently. It adds a flavor to my life that makes it a bit more daring, but not in a bad way. Like a new sauce you've never tried but know you could learn to enjoy.

I remember when I was in elementary school, probably in the second or third grade, and I was learning about the inequality signs, "<" and ">". I remember being so confused, so befuddled as to the reasoning or method to discern between the two. I think it took me weeks to figure it out. They told us something stupid to help us remember it, something to do with alligators eating each other.

Really? You're trying to teach simple arithmetic to 8-year-olds using cannibalistic reptiles as an analogy?

Needless to say even then I thought it was a stupid way to remember it. I thought the kids who drew teeth on the signs were idiots, but I never said anything because I didn't fully understand the signs themselves. I eventually figured out that the side that's bigger faces the quantity that's bigger. That's how I think about it in my head to this day. It's childish, but it works for me.

No goddamn reptiles are eating each other on my binder paper.

These Are the Words of a Gentleman

I vow that this will be my last blog until finals are over.

Today, I completed three course evaluations. This is not including the online evaluation I took for Physics yesterday, so you can imagine my chagrin when the third form was handed to me, a scowl chiseled upon my normally squinty-eyed face.

All in all, I gave good reviews for my classes, except one.

It's a one unit course that I need to take to stay in the Honors program. I spent more time than anyone else in my class because I wanted the department to understand the strong feelings I have for the course and the lack of respect I have for the department in general.

I told them exactly what I thought, and the words I used were exactly as follows:

"What improvements could be made for this course? What were your general feelings for this course? Be as specific as necessary.

Well, Honors Department, judging by the lack of quality in the reading material, I can only give a positive review for the seminar-styled course. Where else can you go but up? When a class such as this gets approve by a board, it gives me hope to know that I have experienced the worst of the worst, and that future classes can only improve from the abomination that is Honors Seminar. Thus, I would like to start with the basics, since I have been asked to be specific.

The readings that were assigned to students were neither thought-provoking nor informative. They were controversial only in name, but the fine students in the Honors program have quickly realized that the department must pick readings at random, because such an eclectic repertoire could only be the result of lack of thought, and not careful consideration. Thus, it is my strong suggestion to implement a strict policy of "interesting-only" assignments. That way, at least we as students will be lucky enough to read something worth our while every so often. We are very fair judges, understanding that complete interest cannot be cultivated or expected from this "department" and expect only a few readings that will actually pique our intrigue. Thus, it would be in everyone's best interest to discontinue the laundry list of rejected philosophers and sociologists that we have been forced to swallow with our noses plugged.

Maybe someday someone will care about these readings, but for the present, there is nothing that could possibly describe the worthlessness that has been our companion one hour per week for the last fourteen weeks.

Hopefully, from our input the program can head toward a different direction and scrap the format altogether. It is neither beneficial for the students nor the teachers that only mildly care about the course.

Our time would be better spent sleeping or reading FMyLife.com, perusing YouTube, or even taking pictures of our fecal matter and sharing it in a discussion format once a week. At least that way, we learn something about each other instead of pretending to care about topics that deserve a much higher platform upon which to discuss.

I would also like to take this time to congratulate the department for sucking out any interest I may have once harbored for the pursuit of knowledge. It must have been a top priority because in my near two-decades of living, I have never lost motivation to question or argue. It is therefore an accomplishment both for the department and the university that I now do not give a penny's worth of scrotum sweat for Morality and Knowledge, the topic about which this class pretended to teach.

If you wish me to be more specific, please watch the film 300 (2007) directed by Zack Snyder. I believe that many viewings of the film will adequately convey the pain I've experience each time I walk laboriously to class. Do not be fooled by the hopeful tone of the film's ending, however, since the survivor is not you, but the students who arise out of the ashes and blood to tell others and warn them of the folly that is Honors Seminar.

To be even more specific, I am a child of immigrants who traipsed their way to America amidst a brutal civil war that tore apart a country. It is therefore not a small thing to say that, after taking this course, I almost feel like my parents experienced that horrendous journey from Vietnam in vain, because the sidewalks paved with gold have been replaced by sewers lined with urine and feces. As a matter of fact, even that metaphor for the dashed American Dream cannot adequately scribe the banality and violent uselessness that I was forced to sit through every week. Though I do not pretend to speak for all the students, I can personally say that I would have preferred an eternity of waterboarding than another minute in this class. I would also like to say that I will enthusiastically trade in my first three children in order to erase the memory of this class from my mind. I do hope the University of the Pacific can compensate for the many years of psychological doctoring that will be required from this traumatizing one-unit nightmare.

I don't even know if I can love after this.

True story: I once saw Lucifer walk into the classroom and leave within five minutes to vomit.

No, he didn't return.

In fact, the only enjoyable part of this course was the opportunity to summarize my thoughts on the incompetence that is the Honors Department during this evaluation.

I hope this has been helpful."




Wait.

These evaluations are anonymous, right?

"Do I Need To Worry About You, Bob?"

As is the case with many people as the second semester comes in full swing, I have been quite caught up with various aspects of my life.

That's just a vague and generalized way of saying I'm busy.

In fact, I'm so busy, that if any of you paid attention to my last post, you would notice the flaw in the date. I don't mean date like Valentine's Day date because...well refer to either Long's blog or below for an explanation.

I'm referring to the date and time the last entry of my blog was posted. The entry talked about Valentine's Day because I published it yesterday (February 14th). However, since I started the post on Tuesday, February 10th, the date corresponded to the start date.

Thus is the extent of my procrastination/busy-ness.

Actually, to be honest, I've been keeping pretty busy with school and stuff. In fact, since I came home for the weekend (Friday ca. 6PM) until now, I have not left the confines of my household. So far, that's about 43-44 hours without stepping outside the doors. My parents would make good prison wardens.

Bob: Can you keep a secret? I'm trying to organize a prison break. I'm looking for, like, an accomplice. We have to first get out of this bar, then the hotel, then the city, and then the country. Are you in or you out?
Charlotte: I'm in. I'll go pack my stuff.
Bob: I hope that you've had enough to drink. It's going to take courage.

My only hope of freedom, ironically, comes around the time we leave for church (ca. 8PM), by which time I will have eclipsed the 48 hour mark...




Well, it could be worse. At least the country's not in an economic recess- oh wait.

Random, Late-night Antics

Firstly, the term "antics" implies that I am up to something and in the dark hours of the night, at that. Well, technically, as many have been prone to point out, I would be up to these "antics" in the wee hours of the morn, as opposed to the night.

Regardless, among these antics I have included starting a blog. I recently created an email address on Gmail (not my first, but my first serious email), and I guess it's time to conform once again.

A few noteworthy cautions before you decide to follow my writing antics:

1. My writing is random and sporadic. Do not expect consistency unless you enjoy getting your hopes crushed miserably by my inability to remain constant, immutable.
2. I apologize ahead of time for any inconvenient arrogance you may detect in my rambling. I think I'm good, so humor me.
3. Conformity is a topic about which I enjoy writing. Complaining about it is probably an outlet for me to deal with my own conformity and lack of individuality.
4. I like self-reference, so pardon my recognition that blogging can be pretentious, or that bloggers probably need to spend more time focusing on other pursuits, namely school, or life in general.


So my late-night antics have taken a new low: blogging. Many of us have dealt with the casual Xanga.com blogging, prettying our sites so that our friends could ooh and ah our flashy, creative web designs. Rarely were our teenage blogs filled with substance. They were an outlet for our emotional ranges, sometimes daily.

However, depending on the person, each blog entry had its unique flavor, its own little style that distinguished it from other blog entries. Some of these were more personal entries, while others were simple ramblings that happen to cross our minds throughout the day. There are many types of teenage blog entries that pervade our Xanga memories, some of which I shall list here, while others I shall list and discuss at a more convenient, sane time.

1. The angry-personal entry: These entries are often posted the night of a particular betrayal or unhappy experience. Bloggers of these entries often are angry enough to personalize their attack in the second person but rarely name the person of their anger.
2. The daily-blase entry: These entries have little substance in terms of intellectual pursuit, but certainly are crucial for friends to keep up with each other. They are often void of emotional bias, being neither sad nor happy overall. Instead, they focus on the events of the blogger's day, or occasional few days if said blogger is lazy.
3. The angst-ridden entry: These entries are definitely "thinking-out-loud" entries. Some of these have a certain stream of consciousness appeal to them, but oftentimes they are just quietly edited entries when someone is trying to reach out for help, or maybe just stating their problems in case someone has a response that will make the blogger feel a bit better.

These three types of entries are but a few of the many types of entries that I have encountered in my teenage observation. Some other time I will expound on them and add to the list of other types of entries I happened to come across in my Xanga/LiveJournal experience. However, for now, it has recently reached the handsome hour of 4 AM, and my bedsheets beckon.

Adieu,
Andrew