of life.

Thu, 05 Apr 2007 04:43:59 GMT

Again, its war and peace
in my mind the battle rages
expand your mind, square.

I know what you want.
I will always deny you.
Sometimes I think I'm crazy.

I change my mind so
That line, I really dislike.
What the fuck is this?

"By the time we change"
he said, sipping on his tea,
"It'll be too late."

Litter needs changing
The cat is at it again
You are o.k, cat.

Inspired by Hendrix, I learned a scale in A. [after thinking about it, I noticed it's the same scale I always played, only apparently a more complete version.]
I played it until my fingers were numb.
Granted, I was stoned at the time so that was what, like... 3 times? ;)

[P.S]
wow, I had to edit this for grammar ~~twice~~ three times.sad fernando. sad.

for the love of god

Thu, 22 Mar 2007 03:49:01 GMT

will a decent band please put out a WHITE t-shirt?
since when is white so hard to find?
damn.

Fri, 16 Mar 2007 02:01:09 GMT

NBC Thursdays just got a whole lot better.

Tue, 13 Mar 2007 21:22:50 GMT

http://econoftech.blogspot.com/

suck it, guy on train.

Tue, 13 Mar 2007 00:07:03 GMT

It's not by chance that I've started writing in this journal again. I've spent the last several weeks reading the thoughts of some of the most influential minds that history have to offer. From King to Erasmus, a Kempis to Castro (granted, he was influential on a smaller scale in world history) I've noticed one striking similarity: powerful writing. I've been lucky enough to stumble upon this relatively early in my career (although more eloquent writing couldn't have hurt in general), and if I am to become noticeable in the world of economics, it's time to start getting my writing in shape.

I've been thinking about the state of education in America a lot lately. Education has always been a topic I've been interested in. In 10th grade I wrote my first paper on the tendency of teachers to make students feel good about themselves rather than helping them actually learn anything. I worked through a couple drafts, and presented it to my teacher,¹ who was thrilled and presented it to several others. I ended up coming to Central Michigan by chance, but I've spent several years at a school known for it's education program learning by association. I work on a project designed to help teachers of basic statistics classes get students interested in their work by presenting them with hands on activities that teach the fundamental concepts of the field. It is with this background that I turn to economics.

Recently I happened upon C-SPAN during a testimony by Bill Gates on the state of U.S. Competitiveness in the global economy. Although I was in a drunken haze at the time (who knew there was such good programming on at 2:00am), I watched in awe as a man so well informed as Mr. Gates confirmed all of my worst fears about the future of the economy given the state of education and technological advancement in the country.

I'm going to start an economics blog. I may solely practice my writing there, but due to sayings like "practice makes perfect" and "practice practice practice," I'll probably continue writing here as well. I feel like a personal journal is not the place to write formally, so the purpose of that blog will be two-fold. Firstly, it will provide a separate location for me to vent my political-economic steam -- first up, the RIAA, MPAA and digital rights management² -- while at the same time also providing me platforms to practice both formal and informal writing. Although my research is in it's very early stages (so far consisting of glancing over a few articles and websites and jotting down some variables that could be included in a measure of teaching proficiency), I'll keep the blog posted on my progress in the quest to bring better teachers into the American educational system.

Anyway. The first day of class was pretty good. The server at work is on the fritz, which sucked because I hardly got anything done today despite my new plan for the piece of the application I'm currently working on. Luckily Dr. Lee ordered a new computer so I'm going to get to use his old machine as my new test server. Maybe he'll let me scrap the ram out of the 8 year old piece of junk I'm using now. That'd be 1337 s4uc3.

Notes:
¹My teacher at the time was Mr. W.A. Mann. He was my favorite teacher by far throughout high school. He also taught economics to the seniors. Coincidence that a teacher that was excited about what he was doing inspired my college major? Doubt it.

²rant: Some tool on the train in Chicago was talking about how both the RIAA and MPAA were done for due to the fact that they're so slow in accepting changes in technology. Again, I was in too drunken / stoned a stupor to create an eloquent argument that shoved it in his face, but that doesn't mean I can't do it in blog form now that I'm not. Seriously. Don't even bother looking at the history of the entertainment media companies you tool, it's not like you'll learn something or anything crazy.

Mon, 12 Mar 2007 05:06:55 GMT

It's been a while since I've written in this, but it's about time to start again.
I got back from Chicago today. I've spent the last few days exploring the city and contemplating life. It was the first trip I've taken in several years, and it was a very welcome change of pace to the mundane life of a small city. Although I like the Mt. Pleasant area, I'm a big city guy at heart. Everyone there was very welcoming, and I met several interesting people.

The trip made me realize how cookie cutter my life in Mt. Pleasant is. It doesn't seem like anyone here is doing anything noteworthy, and those who are are not getting enough credit for what they're doing. For example; CANAL, which is a lab that kyle / tongen / martin work in seems like it should be getting more exposure on campus, although they may be better known around the CPS department than I give them credit for, as I don't spend much time in Pearce as the profs in the dept are notoriously useless for various reasons. This lack of credit / notice seems to be one of the problems with the education system in America. While its true that a lack of passionate teachers is hindering learning, the idea of motivated students not receiving any recognition for their hard word has undoubtedly killed the motivation of many students. In a country where only the top schools receive any notice, a new method of communication needs to be opened in order to help talented individuals who may not have had the chance to attend the top universities. Unfortunately, the environment supplied in Mt. Pleasant doesn't cater to the passionate student as much as it does to the stereotypical frat guy mentality.

...I blame the Internet.

School starts again tomorrow. I'm not really looking forward to it, but the fact that there's only 6 weeks left gives me hope. I miss economics. I finished the required classes, and this semester only had one class to take. It's just not enough. I've been thinking about specializing in macro when I go to grad school, possibly even taking a few grad classes next semester to check it out. I mean, if I'm going to stay here for an extra semester, I might as well push it to the next level.
I picked up the English translations of Fidel Castro's prison letters from the 1950s. I had been curious as to why there was so much fuss about him leaving power and was blown away to read the passion he had to change Cuba during the revolution. His dedication to his cause really inspired me. Don't get me wrong, I'm not a Castro fan boy or anything, but he truly believed in changing the country which had failed him, and he did it as honorably as he knew how.

Anyway, I told myself to write for a few minutes tonight, and have satisfied my goal.
Goodnight.

Mon, 12 Mar 2007 02:00:55 GMT

"My better hours are those in which I forget all that exists in the world and I refocus on the effort of learning something new and useful even if it is just to better understand humankind." - Fidel Castro. March 15, 1955.

[ 3 photos ]

Spring break 2007.

Wed, 07 Mar 2007 01:30:03 GMT

"There are certain queer times and occasions in this strange mixed affair we call life when a man takes this whole universe for a vast practical joke, though the wit thereof he but dimly discerns, and more than suspects that the joke is at nobody's expense but his own. However, nothing dispirits, and nothing seems worth while disputing. He bolts down all events, all creeds, and beliefs, and persuasions, all hard things visible and invisible, never mind how knobby; as an ostrich of potent digestion gobbles down bullets and gun flints. And as for some small difficulties and worryings, prospects of sudden disaster, peril of life and limb; all these, and death itself, seem to him only sly, good-natured hits, and jolly punches in the side bestowed by the unseen and unaccountable old joker. That odd sort of wayward mood I am speaking of, comes over a man only in some time of extreme tribulation; it comes in the very midst of his earnestness, so that what just before might have seemed to him a thing most momentous, now seems but a part of the general joke." - Herman Melville

How ironic.
Spring break 2007.

freak

Mon, 15 Jan 2007 07:33:07 GMT

Hello livejournal, it's been a while.

Mon, 11 Dec 2006 03:26:19 GMT

As I sit here, waiting for my apt-get dist-upgrade to complete, I ponder the Error message that has crippled my laptop for the last half hour.

"The Application 'nautilus' has quit unexpectedly.
You can inform the developers of what happened to help them fix it. Or you can restart the application right now."
Error messages make it seem so easy.

I'm not entirely sure which of my friends, past-friends, aquaintences, and stalkers still read livejournal; but at this time I feel like an update is overdue.

Before I get started, I'd like to quote an excerpt (if you'll allow it) from techCrunch, a site who's RSS feed populates about 100 pixels of my bookmarks toolbar.

"Seattle based Jott will launch its new voice to text product sometime this week. It’s very simple - a user calls a specific phone number and leaves a voice message along with a recipient or recipients (an obvious use for Jott will be for people to leave themselves quick notes). The voice message will then be converted from voice into text and delivered via email or SMS. The recipient or recipients can choose between reading the text or listening to the original voice message."

Sounds good to me.

On to life (which is, after all, the primary theme of most live-journals):
Finals week is here. I've only got one tomorrow, which is nice since whatever cold/cough/birdflu hybrid I've caught has me blowing my nose so often that more than one test tomorrow would probably lead to, as the Weakerthans once so elegantly put, some form of soft suicide. My grades this semester have surpassed those of all other semesters I've spent here at central. I attribute it to the work ethic I've discovered I have while stoned.

That's right. I give the credit for my good grades to the drugs that so many people blame for the dumbening (fairly sure that's not a word -- score one for anti-drug advocates everywhere) of the youth of this country. After such a discovery, why I chose last week to give away all my accessories and cut back on the ganj remains a mystery. Go figure.

I'll be graduating one year from now, a degree in Economics, minor in computer science. I've been told by a few professors that I should head to grad school, but if there's one thing I've had enough of its math; and a masters in Economics would consist of so much calculus I'd undoubtedly take my own life far before I finished. (Interstingly enough, if I had to write a dissertation today, I'd already have a topic.)

[Update manager is demanding a system restart -- hopefully this will fix my nautilus error.]

I got kicked out of a club on friday.
Apparently I'm reppin some sort of emo/bohemian gang.
Bouncers. Pf.

I've got more, but I'd rather get this computer running again, so I'll just end here and go do that.
It was nice talking to you.

Mon, 24 Jul 2006 01:02:40 GMT

When you're an addict, you can go without feeling anything except drunk or stoned or hungry. Still, when you compare this to the other feelings, to sadness, anger, fear, worry, despair, and depression, well, an addiction no longer looks so bad. It looks like a very viable option.

the things you'll do to survive.

Mon, 10 Jul 2006 23:10:03 GMT

as far as stuffing goes, I really don't like it if it's not mixed in with mashed potatos.
but I mean, when you don't have potatos, and you have nothing to eat with the chicken you're making, you have to make exceptions.

Mon, 30 Jan 2006 05:41:17 GMT

sup livejournal?

Sun, 01 Jan 2006 18:38:22 GMT

just to start the year off the right way, I hope everyone had as successful and great new years as the kids in mt pleasant did. :)
word to your mothers.

now that you got what you want, do you want more?

Sat, 31 Dec 2005 21:51:46 GMT

I had an english muffin for breakfast. It was 98% fat free.
I can't help but wonder if the butter I put on it added more than the 98% of fat that the muffin was free of.
probably.

one year ago, I had a pretty similar life to what I have now.
I don't think I smoked then, and if I did, it was way less than I did the rest of the year.
I hadn't met a lot of people that I hang out with on a daily basis now.

I pushed a lot of people away this year as well.
I've found I'm happier when I have less people in my life.
Maybe I'm just insecure.
In either case, I pretty much realize I'm doing it.
If I don't just directly tell you not to be in my life, I do things that make you not want me in your life.
I know I'm doing it.
Sometimes I wish I didn't feel the need to do it.
Sometiems it would be nice to find people tha tI want to stay in my life.
I pushed out my best friends, today I ditched my best friend from highschool, and I've said enough to the girl who at one point made me smile uncontrollably to make that situation nothing but uncomfortable and inconvenient.

So I mean, this year, I lost a lot of cool people, but gained a lot of good people as well.
I sort of like it that way. This semester I'll meet more people that are cool, and by the end of next year, they won't be in my life either.
The ones who have been around for a while that aren't going anywhere, you're the good ones. :)

It's new years eve. Looks like the bar followed by the party here. Something like that anyway. We shall see.
Sorry if it seems like this entry is sad. It's not, it's just how it is.

In any case, I hope next year turns out very similar to this year, because I had a lot of fun, good times with friends, good times with the ladies, good times with nature, It's just been a really good year.
Have fun tonight. Try not to die.

personal hygene man.

Sat, 24 Dec 2005 07:32:20 GMT

I think the best part about having this laptop is that I can lay in bed at 2:15 AM, and stream some tech news brought to me by my favorite techtv hosts, while updating my LJ.
I've had a good 2 days at the parents house, but I'm ready for christmas to be over because I really can't handle being here much longer.
I was *this* close to just forgetting about her. Just saying fuck it, I can't handle all the nervousness and all that crap, but then I opened photoshop to get some pictures off my camera, and there were some of her on the memory card and I was just like siiighhh. ah well. If ashley is fighting for love these days, I guess I can't give up on it.

In other news, I finally got to hang out with kz again after all these months of withdraw. ;) We had some good times, I definately missed her. She'll have you believe that she won 2/3 games of pool... but really it's just because I kept messing up, no skill of her own. There was a little ping pong action, then nikki came over as well for some scrabble action. Just good times.

Tomorrow (or, today really) is my family christmas shindigg. I kind of feel bad because I don't plan on going to church with them. I didn't last year either, but I mean, I think my parents are disappointed that I'm not into religion. Ah well. Either way, I'm excited. Excited... mostly because it's one day closer to going home. I mean, I know that's wrong, but I'm serious. It took me about 10 years to figure out what to ask my parents for for christmas. I really don't need anything. My family makes me uncomfortable, so coming home isn't really all that fun. I'm not religious, and there's nothing I really wanted. So what's my reason for celebrating christmas? I don't really have one. It's not the religion, it's not the family, and it's not the presents. I really don't have a reason, so my excitement... meh. I don't know. I'm just a scrooge. It happens.

I think I'm going to start a real blog. I read enough news on the internet these days that I could fill a real blog with good links and useful info easily. I mean, the number of rss feeds I monitor these days is starting to get huge.

Sigh.
Anyway, I hope you all have a wonderful weekend and whatnot.
It's almost over.

Sat, 17 Dec 2005 18:39:17 GMT

Omg. seriously.
So, if you haven't been keeping score, the MPA (Music Publishers Association) has been going after Lyrics sites and has been threatening tab sites as well. Apparently those things are illegal. Anyway, mxtabs has now removed their tab collection. It's a sad, sad day indeed.

Feel free to send the MPA an email about how they are douchebags.

Tamales, tamales, everywhere!

Sat, 17 Dec 2005 17:14:40 GMT

Well, I'm smack dab in the middle of tamale day. Though, my contrabution is almost complete, as I've got one of the easiest jobs to do today.
I found this. Easyjournal was sweet. Bam 3 years ago.
Anyway, time to get back to the tamales.
This years flavors:
Beef, beans, beans & cheese, cheese, probably raisen, probably some with nothing in them.
Feel free to place your orders ;)

Current count - 37 dozen and still going strong.
man I'm lame for updating LJ so much lately. :P

ps. omgilovetamaledaythereissomuchgoodfoodhereimgoingtobesofatwooooooo!

a smile in the past.

Fri, 16 Dec 2005 22:22:45 GMT

nostalgic.

I remember laying on the floor in my parents hallway.
Listening to ben folds live.

I remember mornings at 2am.
going for walks because we were both up and wanted to hang out.

I remember planning weeks in advance going back to see him.
He started it all.

I don't really know if you read this anymore, so you might never see it, but one of the times that you're here, going through what I've thought in the last months, you'll read it, and know that I was thinking about you at this exact moment.

You can blame it on the postal service.

Fri, 16 Dec 2005 21:49:15 GMT

My head is in the clouds.

I've written well over a page in this very window.
Each sentence I've written I've deleted.
I don't know what to say.
Everyone has ways that they escape.
My thoughts are really scattered today.
Must have been all the activities last night.

I'm going to miss you though.
You were different, it was what I needed.
I still need it.

Maybe in another life.
Lunch will never be the same.

Sun, 11 Dec 2005 08:10:34 GMT

Today:
I painted pottery
Retired from the grocery industry
Bought christmas lights
Had eggs served to me by a cute server
and cleaned the sickest dishes you've seen in your life.

but now all I can think is I hope I don't screw it up.

Thu, 08 Dec 2005 07:18:17 GMT

2:16am.
I need to start going to bed earlier. my sleep schedual has been fucked up lately.
I'm done with painting.
I'm done with micro.

2 down.
sweet.

next week is my last week of school and work, until jan 9th. that'll be nice.
I'm thinking of buying a tv for the apt, since ours... is lacking.

ho hom.
I want to make pottery.

alright, well you have a good night
I'll be thinking of you.

Tue, 06 Dec 2005 23:09:30 GMT

Old propaghada.
click that.

hey.

Sun, 04 Dec 2005 08:43:43 GMT

I just accidently clicked on my 'recent entries thing' and had a really good moment.

1.) Would you rather be happy and poor?
2.) Does being poor have something to do with scene kids?
3.) How much have you changed in the last year?
4.) Do you have motives?
5.) Let's be friends.

[you don't really have to answer those questions, I'm stoned _{(dun dun dun)} at 3:31am _{(dun dun dun)} and those were my questions. I won't argue with you if you do answer them however, because they could spur a conversation.]

I just had an amazing idea for a cool thing to photoshop.
it'll probably be posted here sometime in the near future, though... it might actaully take some time to do. So you know.
... whatever.

Anyway, if you're still reading, I miss you, and you're cool, and hopefully I'll talk to you soon.
xheartx.

_{stick em up. this is a robbery.}

Wed, 30 Nov 2005 07:37:02 GMT

I'm old.