Great thoughts of Fleeting substance

Activity catalog; Last week I…:

-Got 20/20 on my Adaptive processing midterm (along with most of the class).
-Got take home midterm 2 for Adaptive processing (yup, same class).
-Upcoming midterm in Mathematical Pattern Recognition
-Did a lot of homework
-Felt pretty down about stuff.

Um…yeah, that’s it. So in lieu of complaining, story time!

* * * *

When I was young, breakfast was regulated. We didn’t have a lot of exotic cereals around the Preecs household growing up. There was a lot of Kix, a lot of Chex, a lot of Cheereos, normal stuff like that. Boring stuff. *Adult* cereals.

Saturday, though, that was the day.

Saturday, we were allowed to put sugar on our cereal. Yeah, that’s right. Unregulated, too. I would come down in the morning and click on the toons and set myself up with a bowl of Kix and the sugar bowl. And then it was on.

The problem with Kix, though, as a sugar-mouth delivery system, is that they represent an inherently unstable system. You have a spherical, floating object, top-heavy with sugar. Imagine trying to balance yourself on a beach ball in the ocean. What happens? The beach ball rolls over and you fall into the ocean. Same with Kix and sugar. I’d get spinning cereal and I’d loose sugar to the milk. I know it was still in there, but it wasn’t on the cereal, so it didn’t count. Solution, more sugar. Then more spinning, than more sugar.

My parents really should have been paying better attention to me, because I hit that Saturday-morning sugar cereal binge *hard*. Toward the end of that bowl, I would be eating Kix in caramel. I’d get spoonfuls that didn’t even have any cereal in them, just sugar and milk. Did I eat it? Of course I did! Did I then drink the bowl clean of the sweetest milk known to man? Of course I did. Did I then manage to scrape the rest of the not-quite-dissolved sugar off the bottom of the bowl and eat that? A resounding ‘yes’!

That went on for years. My parents never relented on this with any sort of regularity. We always had normal cereal, from when I was a kid to when I finished high school. We never ate stuff with marshmallows or crunchberries or sugar-encrusted coating. It just wasn’t done. That always grated on me too. That stuff was tasty! Why didn’t we eat it?

Of course, eventually, I grew up, went to college, and left my obsession with sugar cereal behind.

…

Oh, wait, I’m sorry, that’s the exact opposite of what actually happened.

When I went off to college, it was open game on sugar cereal. I was a gerbil in a pellet-shop. You couldn’t have kept me away from that stuff with a swat team. The cafeteria at college my freshman year always had sugar cereal of some sort. Always. Some of it was the soft-core ‘Honey-Nut Cheereos’ or ‘Frosted Flakes’, but they got us the hard stuff too. Lucky Charms, Pops, and the black tar heroin of the sugar cereal world, Smacks. Smacks had so much sugar on them that if you squashed them together hard enough, they formed their own impromptu rice crispy treats.

And I hit the stuff hard. Real hard. Every time I ate at the cafeteria, I’d include a bowl of sugar cereal. Every time. Breakfast, lunch, snack, dinner, didn’t matter. There would be some high-fructose corn syrup in there somewhere, by gum. A day didn’t go by that I didn’t make up for an entire childhood devoid of Fruit loops for breakfast. Take that, parents! Your plans at marshmallow-for-breakfast prohibition have failed! Behold as I go back for a second bowl! Mua ha ha ha haaaa!

Eventually, I think I caught up with my sugar norm, though. I was only on campus for a year, and after that I had to buy my own sugary drugs. Over time, the desire teetered away. Never ebbing completely, but certainly returning to more normal levels. I’m an adult now, I don’t need sugar and frosting all over everything I eat.

Well not usually. I just bought a box of *chocolate* lucky charms. I ate my first bowl for dinner. In your face, parents!

-N

--Things I didn’t get done this weekend:
Mathematical Pattern recognition homework
My Taxes
Running
Going to Movie night at Austin’s House

--Reasons I didn’t get them done
I was sick.
Bleagh.

--Things I got done despite being sick
Adaptive processing homework
Playing a lot of video games
Contacting some people about a project for Adaptive Processing Class
Visiting professor for office hours
Lots of reading
Watching all lectures

Course, I had to take painkillers to get anything done. I don’t like taking painkillers, much, just because back in high school I heard phrases like this several times: “Yeah, I usually have to take 4 or 6 Extra-Strength Tylenol for it to really do anything for me.” Crikey! I really don’t want to get my body used to taking painkillers for every little thing, and I *definitely* don’t want to have to take that many to get any relief. I’d rather tough it out. Be a man! Hoo-rah!

I wasn’t sure I was sick, actually, for the early part of the weekend, because I went to my first Advanced class in TKD. It was pretty fantastic. Lots of energy, lots of exercise, lots of good people, and lots and lots of kicking and doing pushups. Good times. I thought, when I woke up Friday morning, that I was just sore from all the exercise. Turns out I was sore from the Viruses, but it took me until later that evening to figure it out. Which means I had to bail on Austin’s movie night again. Which I hate, because movie nights are cool, and his fiancé is an excellent cook. Yum. But I figure, the less infectious, the better, so I bailed like the punk that I am. Blagh.

I’m starting to feel better now, but that might just be the painkillers.

* * * *

School in 3rd grade versus your Masters degree

-In third grade, you could fit 20 math problems on a page.
-In your masters degree, one question can take 10 pages

-In third grade, your parents could help you with your homework
-In your masters degree, your parents don’t understand what you’re talking about, and your *teacher* can’t always help you with your homework

-In third grade, you have to get your homework done before dinner
-In your masters degree, you usually eat dinner while you’re working on homework

-In third grade, cheating is looked down upon
-In your masters degree, cheating gets you kicked out of the school

-In third grade, your parents are on your case to get good grades
-In your masters degree, no one is on your case. In fact, you could probably bluff your way through your masters degree to friends and family. It’s not like they’d actually know the difference.

-In third grade, you get some juice for a break between subjects
-In your masters degree, it’s usually hard liquor.

-In third grade, you bemoan the fact that you will have to go to school for 9 more years, and then college after that! That’s, like, forever!
-In your masters degree, you probably have your graduation marked on your calendar, and when you’re done, you’re actually, finally done. Which feels really weird.

-In third grade, your textbooks are large, heavy, and unwieldy. You give them back at the end of the year.
-In your masters degree, your textbooks are large, heavy, unwieldy, and expensive. You keep them forever.

-In third grade, you draw little funny squiggly symbols all over the margins of your homework.
-In your masters degree, the funny squiggly symbols all over the paper *is* your homework.

-In third grade, you have recess every few hours.
-In your PHD, you stay up for 50 hours straight working on your graduate thesis. (Which is why I’m thinking no on the PHD).

-Everyone finishes third grade.
-Most people don’t even start their masters degree.

-In third grade, the math is *impossible*, there’s no way you’ll ever understand it, and you end up complaining about how much work school is.
-In your masters degree, the math is *impossible*, there’s no way you’ll ever understand it, and you end up complaining about how much work school is.

-N

Hi there everybody, just another day, just another ho-hum, la-te-da day. Nothing to see here, nothing special. What’s that? This thing? This belt here? What, this thing? You want to know about this? Well, it’s nothing special really, just my BROWN BELT! Oh, yeah, Noel’s going to the advanced class. What’s that? The man? Why I believe that would be…ah…me! Oh yeah, I’m da man. Victory! Woot, woot, woot! Aren’t you proud of me, Kevin? Your dumpy little student has progressed all the way to throwing counter kicks. How charming.

I have a midterm this Wednesday. First of the semester. Eep! I’m not actually that worried about it. The teacher says it’s mostly a test to make sure we have all our remedial stuff down pat. Course, he considers a *wide* swath of things to be remedial, so it’s not going to be a cakewalk by any stretch of the imagination, but I’m not stressing over it much. I figure with a little bit more preparation, I should be ready to take this one to the house! And every week that contains a midterm is one less week where I have stuff to learn. So this weekend promises to be a good weekend for planning out my class project.

I got permission from Trung to use the flight test data, and so that’s looking like the best be for my project at the moment. It promises to be a bit easier than some of the other projects I might attempt, just because I have some experience with it and a not-too-shabby block of data to work from.

Valentines day. Blegh. I suppose if there’s one silver lining to spending this much time on school, it’s that I have come to accept my single-ness as an inevitability for the next few months. Good grief, when would I have time? Never, that’s when. Heh. I’ll probably work on my lady-hunting skills along summer and winter. Or perhaps I’ll just wait until next year. Or perhaps I’ll just pull the same maneuver that worked last Halloween and just wait around until a girl stumbles into my lap. Regardless, I’m not worried about being single now. That’s okay. Valentines day can come and go; I’ll catch it later.

I did, however, take the opportunity to go very old school and get those horribly bad valentines day cards for everyone at work I know. Which is a lot of people, as it turns out. I got Harry Potter and Shark Tale Valentines. Choice lines include: “May you have a SPELLBINDING Valentines day” and “Valentines day chills my gills, yo”. Good gravy. Course, I got *candy* for everyone too. I’m a big fan of giving candy to people. I probably made something like 25 or 35 valentines, all told. The list included everyone in 619, my Roommate, my section head, a couple department managers, and our IT guy. Valentines day rule #1, you have to give valentines to everyone, even people you don’t like, and especially girls, even though they have cooties and are totally gross.

I also went out for some munchies with friends from work for dinner before TKD. *Single* friends from work. No couples allowed! Rawr! Heh. It was pretty fun, lots of jawing and lewd humour. Aaah. Genital jokes heal the soul, my friends.

So happy Valentines day to all the couples out there. And to all the single people out there, remember that there are worse things than being single. You could be single and…uh…bleeding internally. At least you’re not bleeding internally, right?

Ah, go hit a bar and buy someone a drink. It’ll make you both feel better.

-N

Something inspired by my awkward multi-lingual conversations with my good pal Hernesto G. (Mis pollo es el madre del Warner Brothers. I have no idea what I'm saying! :)

Take a block of text, go to http://world.altavista.com/ and translate it back and forth between multiple languages until it begins to loose any semblance of the original text. Great fun, here's an example: ripped from the headlines. Original text, from CNN.com:

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- The United States reaffirmed its opposition to two-way talks with North Korea on its nuclear weapons program after the communist state on Friday again demanded bilateral discussions.

White House press secretary Scott McClellan said North Korea would have plenty of opportunities to raise issues directly with the United States if it agreed to resume six-party talks. Those have been on hold since Pyongyang withdrew last year.

North Korea stunned the world Thursday when it publicly admitted to having nuclear weapons and announced it was withdrawing from the multilateral negotiations.

The Bush administration consistently has opposed two-party talks, while North Korea has insisted on a bilateral nonaggression pact with the United States before it will consider dismantling its nuclear program.

As a result of direct talks, North Korea and the United States signed a 1994 agreement in which Pyongyang pledged to freeze and eventually dismantle its nuclear weapons program in exchange for international aid to build two power-producing nuclear reactors.

But the White House has said North Korea's neighbors -- with a greater stake in the negotiations -- also must sign a new agreement.

"It's a regional issue," McCellan said, not an issue between North Korea and the United States.

South Korean Foreign Minister Ban Ki-moon is in Washington for consultations with U.S. officials, including a Friday meeting with Vice President Dick Cheney.

The foreign minister -- whose visit was scheduled before North Korea's declaration -- has additional meetings next week with Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and national security adviser Stephen Hadley.

A senior U.S. official said China continues to receive consultations, too. The White House views Beijing as a key partner in negotiation efforts because China previously has helped get North Korea back to the bargaining table.

In an interview Friday, Han Sung Ryol, North Korea's envoy to the United Nations, told a South Korean newspaper that Pyongyang will consider multilateral negotiations only after bilateral talks with the United States.

"We will return to the six-nation talks when we see a reason to do so and the conditions are ripe," Han told Seoul's Hankyoreh newspaper.

Han was the first North Korean official to speak to outside news media since Pyongyang's Foreign Ministry declared Thursday that the country has nuclear weapons as a deterrent against a U.S. invasion and does not intend to rejoin six-nation disarmament talks any time soon.

International leaders quickly condemned the announcement and urged Pyongyang to return to multilateral negotiations.

In the six-party talks since 2003, the United States, the two Koreas, China, Japan and Russia have held three rounds of talks aimed at persuading North Korea to abandon its nuclear weapons development in return for economic and diplomatic rewards. But no significant progress was reported in those talks, which China hosted.

English -> German -> French -> English -> Italian -> English

WASHINGTON (Cnn) -- than del joined still Declares has assessed the relative opposition alle arguments with the Korea of North sul relative program dell' nuclear weapon, after that the Communist still declares the bilateral arguments demanded friday. The secretary of the pressed one of the house Scott McClellan Korea of aforesaid North would have directly to raise many the occasions, of the dispendio with joined Declares, if it therefore einverstandenWAR still in order to take the conversations of six-Partei. Those were on an infuence, since Pyongyang has still taken the year past. Betaeubte of the Korea of North the world thursday, when it has allowed public the accreditation of the nuclear crews and of the universal mediations it one announces has withdrawn itself. Bush municipal everywhere to the opposite conversations of two-Partei, while the Korea of North insistito on the nonaggression that a joined bilateral pact with Declares, before that does not consider to remove the relative program centers them turning out the Korea of North and those of the joined one Declares the direct conversations sluices a contract in 1994, to promised Pyongyang, in order to freeze and removes finally the relative program of the nuclear weapon against the international attendance, in order to develop to produce nuclear of the two motors. But the House White woman has said that the vicinoi of the Korea of North -- with one greater bar in the mediations -- they must also stipulate a new contract. "they are not dispendio regional," has said McCellan, dispendio between the Korea of North and joined It declares. Of the south. The Korean prohibition of the Minister for the foreign relationships Ki-Mond is to Washington for the consultations that the JOINED servant of the civils DECLARES, comprised friday one reunion with vice-president Dick Cheney. The Minister for the foreign relationships -- of of which the call before that the explanation of Korea of the north is not fixed -- ago To declare the additional reunions the following week with the secretary the rice of Condoleezza and one emergency of councilman Stephen Hadley di Dichiarare. Oldest JOINED China DECLARES that continuous the aforesaid civil employee to receive the consultations, also. The house white woman considers Peijing like associate key within, because China has helped before the reception of the return the mediation efforts the Korea of North to the negotiation table. In an interview friday, Han sung Ryol it has declared, transmitted of the Korea of North to the nations, south. Korean newspaper that Pyongyang only considers of the universal mediations after that the bilateral arguments with joined Declare. "we come the nation from six to the conversations, if we see that a reason to make therefore and the states of being mature," the newspaper with of Hankyoreh Han Seoul of explanation of the return. Han was first of the north. Korean civil employee to speak foreign means about ministry of the external information since explained Pyongyangs to thursday that the nuclear crews of the country as the factors dissuasi you he has and does not plan JOINED DECLARES against an invasion in order to re-unite soon still one constantly nation of disarmament six of the conversations. The international heads have condemned the publicity quickly and have pushed of Pyongyang, to diminish with the universal mediations speak the six-Partei from 2003, joined He declares that he has is Korea, China, three Japan that Umlaeufe of Russia of the held conversations that they are headed on that they leave the Korea of North in a convincing sense, the relative development of the nuclear weapon in the return for the ricompense economic and diplomatic. But no important progress has been to realize to a report/ratio in these conversations, received China.

Comments 1) Looks like 'North' and 'South' made it through okay, but pretty much nothing else.
2) Condoleeza Rice: House white woman.
3) What's with all the JOINED DECLARING?

He he. Silly,

-N

// posted by Noel @ 11:12 AM (0) comments

Look, theme and variations, family style. Some of these came out better than others.

Dad, who is an excelent surgeon


Dad, were he a surgeon of significanly less tallent


Mom: loving nurturer and excelent person


Mom: international superspy and woman of mystery


K: youngest sister, who is pleased to meet you


K: youngest sister, who is really, really, really pleased to meet you


S: Middle sister, who wants to see the world


S: Middle sister, who wants to rock and roll all night, and party every day


Yeah, that last one really doesn't look anything like S. Does come off as a pretty good estimate of Gene Simmons, though.

-N

Variations on a theme:

Okay: http://illustmaker.abi-station.com/index_en.shtml)http://illustmaker.abi-station.com/index_en.shtml

I've been seeing these pretty-darn-clever avatars all over the internet of late. It's a neat way to get a picture of yourself that looks pretty much like you do, but all cartoony and neat. Lots of fun. I recommend trying it out. Here's me:



A little skinnier than real life, perhaps, but a pretty good likeness, I'd say.

What struck me as particularly neat about the whole thing is that while you're going through all of the options, you get to see what you would look like with different hair, eyes, nose. Variations. Exemplary, here are some of my favorites.

'Ready to lay the smack down' Noel



'Mega-Crazy Whatzit' Noel



And My personal Favorite, dubbed 'Giga Neko Kawaii-Super Bold Noel-Chan: Eternal Love'



Ma ha! That's great.

In other news, the Ash Wednesday Fast is progressing well, unless you count the hunger. :) Actually I wasn't that bad off. Makes me wonder if I could survive on this level of food consumption. I'm guessing not, but it's certainly a weight loss program wouldn't you say? 'Abs of Jesus'. I could see it.

Also, since it's lent now, I'm not allowed to complain about school. This is a problem, though, because people are still asking how school is going. And I can't very well say it's going 'good', because that would be lying. So I've settled upon 'tough'. I may expound on the difficulty inherent in the academic process as much as I want. Cause let's face it, they wouldn't call it a 'masters' degree if it didn't require you to master something, and it wouldn't be worth the effort if it was easy to get. So that's valid.

Erin's Birthday is this Friday, happy birthday to her, and so I'll be heading out to the beach to enjoy bonfire and munchies. NO MEAT BECAUSE IT'S LENT, but I'll probably forget anyway. I'm really bad at the Friday-meat thing. It's tricky. There's nothing obvious about the day. If there was some sort of meat-less aura that hung in the air on Friday, that I could handle. It's easy to do, just hard to remember. I'm bad at remembering stuff that's associated with calendars. Birthdays, Holidays, Anaverseries, Fridays in lent. It is a personal weekness I have come to accept and embrace.

Second half of my TKD test in a few hours. Terribly excited. Wish me luck!

-N

*Warning*. This blog entry contains material of an incredibly angry, caustic, swear-happy nature. Parental discretion is advised. No, seriously. This is one for the record books. Put the kids to bed before you read this and clear your history after you’re done. It might not even be legal to read these words in some areas. Turn back now. You probably don’t want to read this. It’s not nice. It’s not pretty. It’s a catharsis. Lot of swearing, lot of mindlessness. That’s why the ****Warning****. You keep reading; you’ve been warned. This is going to hurt.

* * * *

I.

Fucking.

Hate.

School.

I hate it. I hate it more than I hate anything else in my life. I despise school. USC could be wiped off the face of the earth tomorrow and I would do a little jig. What’s that? All the work I’ve done on my masters degree is for naught? Well who cares? I don’t have to do this stupid shit anymore! I can go back to a regular life full of, gee, I dunno, ENJOYMENT and OCCASIONAL REST, and NOT FUCKING WANTING TO BASH MY HEAD IN!

What the hell, what the fucking hell? This is stupid. This was an uninformed decision. Excuse me, sir, do you regret anything? I’m going to be famous one day, and someone’s going to ask me if I regret anything, and I’m going to say, “Yeah, I regret getting my skullfucking masters degree because it was the worst decision I ever made.”

I am miserable all the fucking time. I don’t rest. Just, ever. When I come home from work, I get to eat dinner, and then I have to get right to watching my class right away or I won’t finish it before the end of the day. How come? Because it’s like hitting yourself in the face. Think of it like that. That’s a good metaphor. For every hour of class I watch, it’s like I have to hit myself in the head, repeatedly, for an hour. Just imagine that. You’ve spent a long day at work, you come home, and you have to sit down and hit yourself in the face for 1.5 hours. And you can’t just not do it. You have to, you don’t have a choice. And you can try and dress it up, but it’s still ‘you hitting self in face’. And that’s my short day. I have 4.5 hours of class to watch on Thursday. FOUR and a HALF FUCKING HOURS! BLOODY SKULLFUCKING DEATHSHITTER! GWARG!

And that’s before the homework. Yeah. Homework. It has consumed my weekends. That’s right. I watch classes on weekdays, I do homework on weekends. That’s it. That’s my rest time, right there. Because before I can even start working on my homework, I have to read my textbook. Have you ever read a textbook? No, no you fucking haven’t! Because you know it’s a horrible, hideous idea. Because textbooks are shit! Because if you could read a fucking textbook and learn the fucking material on your own, you wouldn’t need a bloody fucking teacher, now would you? No! I’d just read this shit and you’d be out of a fucking job! But I don’t, and you know why? Because reading textbooks is a stupid fucking idea! But you know what? It’s just like hitting myself in the face, I have to do it. I have to read it to do the homework so I can get the grades and keep Raytheon happy so they don’t make me bay for these bloody wastes of time they call ‘education’.

Don’t. Don’t even try to make this okay. Don’t be like. “Aww, it’ll be over soon.” Or, “You’ll be so happy when you’re done.” Damn straight I’m going to be happy when it’s done, wouldn’t you be happy to get a pencil removed from your eye after having it in for two years? That’s not the point! If I were stabbing myself in the left leg, you wouldn’t be like, ‘oh, it’s okay’. No! You’d be like, “Shit! Stop fucking stabbing yourself! Why are you doing something like that?” You wouldn’t be like “Well, at least you’re not stabbing yourself in *both* legs.” This isn’t okay. It’s not good. It’s bad. I shouldn’t feel okay about it because it isn’t fucking okay. It’s horrible! It’s bad through and through. I don’t care if I get a masters degree out of this. I don’t fucking care! I’m miserable. I hate everything. I don’t have any time for myself or for anything I want to do. I fucking hate school and it makes me angry about every fucking thing else.

I rest in snippets. I can’t read 50 pages of a textbook all at once. I can’t watch 4.5 hours of class. So the only time I really get to rest is when I put this shit on pause and go do something else. It never lasts. You have to go back. Another 2 hours of self-inflicted pain. Good fucking luck getting some rest about that. I watch TV to relax, T-fucking-V. Because it’s the only way to just turn my brain off. Just totally off. Fuck it. I’m not learning shit today. Go away.

And work too! They’re teaching me new shit at work! I wouldn’t mind, if that was it, but it’s like trying to stuff an entire loaf of Wonderbread down your throat. Sure you can do it if you try hard enough, but why would anyone do that shit? It’s a stupid fucking idea. So is college.

I don’t get days off. I don’t have days when there isn’t any stupid shit for me to do. There’s always stupid shit for me to do. There may be *hours* where there isn’t any stupid shit for me to do, but never a full day. I’ve got homework to do and studying to do and a textbook to fucking read and I haven’t even started my shitsucking project yet! FUCK, FUCK, FUCK!

Do you know the most common phrase I utter these days? “I’d love to, but I’ve got school.” Take a fun class? “School.” Play the drums? “School”. Hobbies? “School”. Vacation? Gee, I dunno, but it’ll have to happen around fucking school!

You know what? If you want to get your degree while working? Don’t. Just fucking don’t. This isn’t an argument. It’s a fucking statement. Don’t. You need extra money? I recommend prostitution. At least there is a *chance* you’ll enjoy prostitution.

I need a fucking drink.

Serious. When this semester is over, I’m going to drink for a day. And when my degree is over I’m going to drink for a week. Just straight. I’m going to bring a bottle of vodka to my last final, and when I hand it in I’m going to walk out the door and just drink the whole fucking thing. And I’ll black out and spend the next week in a drunken stupor and just let the pressure fucking drain. I don’t care. I hope I kill off every brain cell that was ever tainted with any knowledge of how to calculate the estimate of the Power Spectral Density. IT’S THE FORNIER TRANSFORM OF THE AUTOCORRELATION ESTIMATE! WHO FUCKING CARES?

You want to know why I’m doing this? I gave up complaining about school for Lent. This is my fat Tuesday, where I get it all out of the way. But you know why I’m not posting this on Tuesday? Huh? Do you? Here, come close, I’ll whisper it in your ear…

BECAUSE I’M NOT GOING TO HAVE FUCKING TIME ON TUESDAY BECAUSE STUPID SHITWHORING THUGFUCKING MOTHERBITCHING ASS-DEATH-WHORING SKULLFUCKING SCHOOL!!!!!!

I fucking hate it. I fucking hate it to death. I wish it would just die. I hate school, I hate school, I fucking, fucking, fucking, fucking, fucking hate school. Just fucking die. Fucking get off my back and die. I hate you; you are the worst fucking thing ever. Why are you even still fucking here? Just fuck off and die. Go play in traffic. Fuck you, school, fuck you for making me miserable, fuck you for taking two fucking years from me, fuck you for making me hate engineering, fuck you for keeping me from being happy, fuck you for making me angry, fuck you for making me swear, fuck you for making me a whiny little bitch who only complains about school, fuck you and your presumption, and your emotionlessness, and your bloody tasks, and your fucking projects, and your stupid-as-shit homework, and your fucking lectures, and your useless fucking discussions and your expensive fucking textbooks and your costs and your demands and every single, solitary, stupid, fucking thing about you.

I fucking hate school.

Rules to making an interesting Blog

So I was curious. I know blogs have sort of reached the 'phenomenon' point once again, and I do realize that I have a blog, but I was missing a point here. People read other people's blogs. That's just how it works. But good grief, why?

My blog is really sort of an update forum for people who might want to know what I'm doing. Heck, it grew out of a desire to keep from e-mailing large numbers of people with the same info and stories and the like. But this doesn't make for riveting blogging. This doesn't give people who don't know me any reason to come check this thing out.

But somewhere out there, they do. There are blogs written by people that are read by hundreds and thousands of complete strangers. Why? What has made this blog thing so darn popular?

I went to the 'bloggies 2005' award site and got to cracking. Herein are the popular ones. Herein you find the phenomenon. This is why these things are popular. Stuff like this.

So here's what I've determined.

Really, when it comes to making a popular blog, it's all about having something that the average person might want to read. Diversity springs off from there, but that's the trunk. Things that have public interest, like politics, knowledge, or, lets say, porn, tend to make for popular web logs.

Neat, huh?

Okay, so this got me to thinking about what I might want to do here. Do I want a popular weblog? Nah, not really. I wouldn't shun fame out of hand, but that's not what I'm trying to do here. But interest, I am a big fan of interest. Even for people that are just reading this to see what I'm up to. You wouldn't mind interest, would you? Course not.

When it comes to personal web logs, the most popular, or perhaps just most common, method of adding personal interest is storytelling. 'Today I went to a party'. Booring. 'Here is a dynamic short story about some random event at the party.' Interest.

I am not going to pretend that I have enough time or energy to be storytelling every other day, and heck, I'm probably not interesting enough to do it anyway, but perhaps there's something to be said for a more intriguing format every once in a while, eh?

So who's up for a story?

* * * *

Trying to describe the sensation is almost impossible. It's like my hands have been covered in fabric. It's like my sense of distance as related to touch is completely off the rafters. It's like some sensation that ripples up my arms and ends in my teeth.

I really hate this feeling, I don't know why it shows up. You get used to the kinks and quirks of your body after a few years, and this shows up every once in a while, but I've never gotten used to it. It's like running my hands over a mesh grid made of jucy peach-flesh.

I think the last time I felt like this was because I had a fever. Fever always does strange things to the mind, and I remember some of the strangest dreams when I had fevers as a younger child. Sometimes my body felt like this too, I think.

Gaaah! Now it's like my fingers are skeletal-thin!

It set in late this evening, round 9:00. Nothing particularly notable on the onset, just that sinking sensation that this has happened before. Oh, no. It's that strange feeling again.

I can spend hours just trying to figure out what it is, exactly, I'm feeling. It's like a weight in my chest, or a glitch in my nerves. I look down at my hands, and they don't look the way they feel. They feel stubby. They feel like they're touching something.

Uwarg...ugh...almost gone now.

Yes, I was going to write about something else, but then my hands and mouth started weirding out on me, in this way that has *precisely* happened before, and I feel compelled to document the occasion, though, unfortunately, no ammount of words can capture the indescribable strangeness, and yet *familiarity* of the sensation. I guess I just have to write 'that strange feeling' and hope for the best.

* * * *

Okay, that was probably one of the stranger stories I could have possibly written. But then again, this blog rarely makes sense to anyone but me, I think.

I'll try and write something more popular next time.

-N