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Tuesday, November 10th, 2009
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1:38 pm - Confused, but not complaining
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I am pleasantly, but confusedly, surprised by UT's class cancellations. Tomorrow is Veteran's Day and we have no classes. Since I don't recall ever getting Veteran's Day off at Case or in grade school, I do find it interesting that it's being observed. And we didn't have Columbus Day off a month ago, which surprised my brother who didn't have to work that day, so it isn't as if the university is observing all the holidays.
On the plus side, since my Genetics lab holds a section on Wednesday and the holiday interferes with it, lab was canceled for the entire week, so I get the afternoon off today. My Organic Chemistry lab on Thursday was canceled as well, which is pretty odd, considering there is no Wednesday section for the holiday to interfere with; the sections are on Tuesday, Thursday, and Friday. The logic behind the cancellation was that back when we had fall break on a Monday and Tuesday, the Tuesday lab section got canceled but the Thursday/Friday sections remained, which meant the Tuesday section was a lab behind. To make up for it, Thursday and Friday sections get the week of Veterans Day off. Which is great and all, but I honestly don't understand why they didn't just give everyone the week of fall break off and not have to worry about this balancing act. I guess the chemistry department just likes to complicate things. Still, as a result of all this, I have a nice little break in the middle of the week with Wednesday off and only one class in the morning on Tuesday and Thursday.
The other odd thing is that instead of the customary Thursday and Friday off for Thanksgiving, UT is also giving us that Wednesday off for whatever reason. And because this interferes with the sections of Genetics lab again, my holiday weekend will officially begin that Tuesday at 9:15 AM. Can't argue with that.
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| Wednesday, November 4th, 2009
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7:01 pm - A post about posting
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I can't really think of anything to say, but I haven't updated in days, which is a direct violation of my contract. Simply waiting around for inspiration and motivation leads to nothing but rather long periods of waiting, as can be evidenced by the past few years of this journal's archives, so if I am to fulfill my aforementioned contractual obligations, I have to take the initiative and motivate myself.
The problem, of course, lies in my procrastinatory nature. Most of my free time occurs during the earlier part of the day, when I'm on campus, sitting at my laptop between classes (and occasionally during classes). However, at this point, I am fully aware that most of the day is still ahead of me and am in no hurry to start pondering what I might be able to write about in my journal, much less to actually do said writing. But by the time I get home, it's the latter part of the afternoon and I have things to do and my parents sometimes have things for me to do, and on some evenings, free time is a bit harder to come by. It also doesn't help that I find myself getting sleepy earlier and earlier. Daylight Savings was no help on that matter, and the extra illumination in the morning hours doesn't seem to be helping me wake up any earlier either, although it's certainly welcome during my morning drive.
I'm not even looking for seemingly interesting topics to write about (especially since "interesting" is such a subjective term anyway) and these posts don't have to be long or anything, although it certainly helps to have something with a bit of substance to say. I'm just surprisingly bad with open-ended things; I can never seem to just pull random ideas out of my head. Vague questions like "What's new?" are almost always answered by "Nothing much." I'm terrible at starting conversations, because I can never think of something to say.
So I don't know, does anyone have anything they want me to talk about? Feel free to try to inspire me so I can continue to post often. Unless you're getting tired of my constant updates and enjoy the moments of silence. Of course, I'm not forcing anyone to read anything I write, so if you're sick of it but still reading, it's entirely your own fault. But if you enjoy my random musings, I hope to continue to entertain you.
P.S. If at any point my writing starts to sound in any way reminiscent of Terry Pratchett's (or just slightly more British-sounding), it's only because I'm rather engrossed in Discworld books at the moment, and I have a tendency to temporarily absorb bits of personality and style from things and people. If I'd actually been updating this journal during any of the times I was watching Firefly, I probably would have thrown in a few "ain't"s somewhere, despite objections from my Inner Grammarian. As long as I don't start speaking in capital letters, there should be little to worry about.
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| Thursday, October 29th, 2009
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8:47 pm - Books: The Original Internet
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I'm proud of myself because lately I've somewhat gotten back into the habit of reading again. The amount of leisure reading I'd done over the past couple years was really pathetically low, even by my standards. But I found a good way to ease myself back into it and that was with Discworld books. The very nice thing about Pratchett's writing is that not only is it extremely entertaining, it also reads quickly. Which is good news for me, because I generally read very slowly. Which, of course, means that I still read Discworld books more slowly than someone else would, but that doesn't matter.
And it's nice that I have long breaks between my classes during which I can get some reading done, because my laptop can only keep me entertained for so long. (Probably because I don't have WoW installed on it.) The one thing that annoys me is the limited amount of space in my backpack. With all the stuff I need to carry around in it on a regular basis, I have almost no space for anything extra, and if the book I'm reading happens to be a larger hardcover book, I can barely fit it in. And if I have to take one of my textbooks or my giant Organic Chemistry lab manual to school on a given day, I have no room for the book.
I once learned that I should always carry a book with me when I'm at school, because the day I don't have one handy will be the day I could use it most. This happened a few days ago, when I realized the night before that I hadn't done the reading for my English class the next day, so I opted to switch out my Discworld book for my English text and get the necessary reading done in the morning, before class. I did all this, and then found out that the class that day was canceled. I didn't mind having read ahead for it, but I was pretty annoyed that I suddenly had an extra hour of free time and no Discworld book to read.
Therefore, if any of you are acquainted with a wizard who could convert my backpack into a Bag of Holding, please pass along their contact information.
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| Wednesday, October 28th, 2009
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6:59 pm - Sleep and the lack thereof
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I have to marvel at the people who can sleep for short periods of time and seem generally unaffected, because any time I get 6 or fewer hours of sleep, I am very aware of experiencing some symptoms of sleep deprivation. This discrepancy can probably be attributed to the fact that these people are probably used to getting so little sleep on a regular basis, whereas I now strive to maintain a regular schedule that allows me to get a sufficient amount of sleep each night. With my classes forcing me to wake up at 6:30 in the morning, this means that to get as close to the recommended 8 hours as possible, I go to sleep sometime between 10 and 11 PM on weekdays, a bedtime which everyone except young children and the elderly would likely object to. It should also be noted that in my natural state (eg. on a weekend when I don't have to wake up by any specific time), I can easily sleep for about 9 to 10 hours. So in my case, it's not only the lack of sleep that affects me but also the fact that I'm so unaccustomed to it.
Of course, I don't approve of or encourage the five or six hour sleep habits that some people fall into. The more I read about the effects of sleep deprivation, the more I'm convinced that the average person could benefit greatly from getting a couple more hours in each night. But there is certainly something useful and adaptive in being able to function well when, due to circumstances beyond your control, you only manage to get four or five hours of sleep, instead of spending the day sluggish, bleary-eyed, and noticeably lacking in concentration.
Then again, I do believe that many people who are regularly deprived of sleep actually do experience such symptoms (or cover them up with copious amounts of caffeine), but more likely either subconsciously ignore them or attribute any problems as merely their natural state of being. People don't like to think that things like memory and concentration difficulties, mood swings, or states of depression could be caused by deficits in sleep because we much prefer to think that all those hours spent unconscious could be done without. After all, we have so many things that need to be done and that we want to get done and so few hours in the day to do them, why should we waste so much of our time sleeping?
I don't hold this view because I actually consider sleep to be one of the great pleasures in life and am perfectly content devoting 8-10 hours of my day to it. I'm sure part of this is due to the fact that I am aware of my dreams often enough to be able to enjoy experiencing them, even though I rarely remember the contents of many of them even 30 minutes after waking from them. In fact, even though I only slept 4-5 hours last night, I recall having had at least two dreams during the course of the night. The other reason I like sleep is that a good night's rest makes me feel good. Or perhaps it would be more accurate to say that it prevents me from experiencing the kind of irritability I get when I don't sleep well enough. Either way, I see sleep as a personal panacea. If I'm in a bad mood on a given day, my instinct is to not want to do anything except sleep, and this is not necessarily a bad instinct to have because when I wake up the next day, I'm usually feeling much better.
So obviously I have a lot of faith in the power of sleep. It's a very obvious necessity of life that people sometimes seem to ignore. So whenever you're not feeling 100% your best in one way or another, I encourage you to strive for a good night's rest, if you can. At the very least, I'm pretty convinced that it couldn't hurt to try.
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| Tuesday, October 27th, 2009
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12:50 pm - This post is brought to you by Regina's Hatred Of Labs
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Among the many reasons as to why I dislike writing lab reports (most of which are related to the length of time it takes to write them and the numerous other things I would much rather be doing during said time) is the fact that I feel like I keep saying essentially the same thing about five times throughout the report. To illustrate my point, I present you with a summary of parts of the lab report I just finished writing.
Abstract: DNA hybridization was used to determine the genetic similarity of different species.
Introduction: Hey! Do you know what hybridization is? It's a technique that can be used to determine the degree of genetic relatedness between species.
Methods: We used the procedure in the lab manual to perform hybridization to test the genetic similarity of several species.
Results: Our hybridization experiments show that some species, like chickens and turkeys, are genetically similar. Bet you didn't see that coming.
Discussion: Since their DNA hybridized, our hypothesis that these species are similar has been confirmed. How exciting!
The unfortunate thing is that the discussion is supposed to be the most developed section in the report, but by the time I get to it, I feel like everything has already been discussed and there's little more to say. Ultimately, it is just repetition, but by that point, I'm so sick of repeating myself, that my brain chooses to give up and writes something short and sweet. The obvious remedy for this would be to write the discussion first, but I find that difficult to do when I haven't written all the parts leading up to it yet.
But on the plus side, I only have half the semester left to suffer through Genetics lab and Organic Chem lab. Next semester, I still have the second half of Organic Chem lecture, but I don't have to take the lab, as it's not one of my major requirements (for which I am eternally grateful). I have Cell Biology lab next semester and that's the last of my labs. Unless I end up working in a lab... but that's another matter entirely.
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| Monday, October 26th, 2009
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12:25 pm - A New Endeavor
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It has occurred to me that I should try to post here again. And on a regular basis, too. Not because I have anything of real interest to say or think that the people reading this are curious about what's going on with me, but because it would be a good way for me to practice writing and get back into the habit of it. After all, I still hold on to the hope that I will continue to pursue my hobby of writing fiction, a hobby which has gone neglected for far too long. That's also something I do more for my own personal enjoyment and fulfillment than for the hope that other people will read and like it, although the latter is always an added bonus.
Admittedly, I do a fair amount of writing for school nowadays, but most of that writing tends to be of the more scientific variety. And since my attempt to infuse some creative alliteration into my lab report ("provide practice in proper pipette procedure") did not seem to have any positive effect on my grade, I shall leave that stuff for a medium such as this. Of course, there's no guarantee that regularly updating my LJ will in any way improve my writing skills or motivation, but it certainly can't hurt.
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| Saturday, June 20th, 2009
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5:27 pm - Eye of the Heart
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I think I'm often too hard on myself for getting particularly emotional, in those relatively rare instances when it happens. I just don't quite understand why something that I should have gotten over by now still bothers me as much as it does.
There's nothing quite so depressing as looking into the mirror and witnessing the sadness in your own eyes.
Don't mind me, I just feel the need to complain and be a bit melodramatic once in a while. :P
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| Sunday, May 17th, 2009
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2:02 pm - The long-awaited update
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So as I mentioned before, there's a post I had been meaning to make for many months that is now well overdue. I've pretty much procrastinated on it until the last possible moment. The reason I never got around to posting it before was that I had expected it to be a particularly long entry and, knowing this in advance, I never could quite motivate myself to take the time to sit down and write it. Even now, I don't think I can motivate myself to do that. So this post is going to be the ultra-condensed version of the "here's what's going on with me" variety for those few people who read my blog but whom I haven't yet told this and who might actually care. So, in my best "long story short" fashion, here's the deal...
After graduating with a bachelor's in psychology a year ago, I was looking for work. I needed some way to get references for grad school and something positive on my record to balance out my grades. I also wasn't sure what I wanted to do specifically when it came to choosing a graduate program and I needed some time to figure that out. Having been unable to find work, I began to look into other options.
Ultimately, I decided to go back to school for a second bachelor's degree. Thus, starting tomorrow (hey, I did say I was procrastinating with this post), I will be starting classes at the University of Toledo for summer semester, pursuing a degree in biology. Why biology? Because I'm seriously considering graduate study in the field of neuroscience, which is essentially a direct combination of biology and psychology. For a graduate program in neuroscience, I would need some biology background and spending the time to get a full degree allows me to cultivate a new, hopefully much higher GPA, obtain laboratory experience (if not with a job, then at least through classes), and find people who could give me adequate recommendations for grad school. It will also allow me to see if I like biology well enough to either confirm my interest in studying neuroscience or to make me think twice and maybe consider experimental psychology programs instead. Finally, even if I don't go to grad school for some reason (or not right away), a second degree should at least broaden my options for finding work.
In order to complete my degree in the shortest amount of time (which seems to be approximately two years, one-and-a-half at best), I had to take an intense summer schedule this term. I'm essentially taking a year's worth of introductory biology and chemistry classes (as well as their respective labs) in the 12 weeks of summer semester. As a result, I have chem and bio lectures every day from 8 until 11:30, and on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, I have a two-hour break, followed by a chemistry lab from 1:30 to 4:20, while on Tuesdays and Thursdays, I have no break and a biology lab from 11:40 until 3:10. Since this arrangement cuts a year off the time it will take me to graduate, it will be well worth it in the long run. Though I am concerned about going into such a busy schedule after having spent a year doing practically nothing, I am focusing on the idea that if I can handle this summer, the rest of my semesters will be relatively easier. And what doesn't kill me, hopefully only makes me stronger.
So that's what's going on with me in the near and somewhat distant future. In other news, I'm in somewhat of a bittersweet mood right now. Yesterday made me feel both worse and better at the same time, so I suppose it balances out. Once my subconscious mind decides to cooperate, it will be easier. Until then, there's always Janne da Arc to make me happy. :)
P.S. Who is as amused as I am by the fact that my "ultra-condensed" version of events still makes for a pretty damn long entry? :P
current music: "Kokoro no Yukue" by Janne da Arc
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| Thursday, April 23rd, 2009
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11:41 am - A brief psychological tangent
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Since correlation does not imply causation, the reason for the relationship between things is often anyone's guess. Psychology is a field where this issue crops up a lot. Does something physical or chemical in the body lead to a condition of the mind? Or is it something in the mind that leads to problems with the body? Unfortunately, the answer is often "both," which provides very few answers to the question at hand. It also lends itself to a vicious cycle, like how lack of sleep can lead to depression and depression can cause insomnia. In the end, we are forced to not dwell so much on causes but instead focus on the possible solutions to any given problem. But how truly useful are these solutions when we are so uncertain about the underlying cause?
A lot of things in life are really about mindset. Many situations are neither truly good nor bad, so the way you look at things is a major factor. Additionally, finding the good in a bad situation (or the bad in a good situation) can change everything. Worrying often does more harm than good, which is why the phrase "don't let it get to you" is actually very good advice. Unfortunately, this advice does virtually nothing when it comes to actually SOLVING a problem, because in the end, you're just waiting and not actually doing anything about it. The worst part comes when "don't let it get to you" is your only reasonable option in dealing with an issue, since you know that the problem itself still exists. Thus, no matter how good that advice may be, it becomes extremely difficult to follow.
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| Tuesday, April 21st, 2009
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12:01 am - The brief, pointless non-update
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I need to make a lengthy, informative post about what's going on with me sometime relatively soon. It's so long-overdue, it's not even funny.
In an attempt to keep this blog alive, I'm also entertaining the notion of making extremely short (perhaps sometimes cryptic) posts whenever it strikes my fancy to do so. I'm just not sure what purpose that would serve.
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| Thursday, January 29th, 2009
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8:48 pm - Ah, the power of mental conditioning
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I am very glad that I managed to attain lucidity during a dream I had last night or else it would very likely have been a nightmare. In my dream, I was standing in a field, but surrounding me were fences and cages, behind which were numerous dogs. Even without my signature phobia, this would have been pretty scary, because the dogs in question were large, angry, vicious guard dogs that could easily have jumped over the fences or broken through the doors of the cages... especially since fears of such things occurring were clearly running through my mind. However, soon I realized that I was dreaming, and through the power of positive thinking, I was able to keep the dogs safely behind within their various confines. Thus, I knew that they could not harm me, and I felt no fear as I walked past them. How cool is that?
current mood:  good
current music: Acid Black Cherry -- "20th Century Boys"
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| Saturday, January 17th, 2009
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11:16 pm - Reporting, one stray thought at a time
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It's been a very long time since I've updated this journal, and my plan had been to make a post of numerous random thoughts and observations that have been going through my mind over the past few months. But whenever I try to organize all of them in my mind, there are just so many that I quickly find myself too lazy to write them all down in one entry. Still, it's getting pretty ridiculous just how long I've gone without updating my blog at all, so I'm going to remedy the situation by posting these various observations one-by-one as I think of them. Since they're rather short, I can update in small bursts, instead of writing up my entries in essay-length, getting halfway through, and then deciding I don't feel like finishing. Which is a very common occurrence for me, unfortunately.
Anyway, one thing currently on my mind:
I find it amusing that I can often correctly spell words I might not necessarily know the definitions to, while many people can't spell words they DO know the definitions to.
It also makes looking up words in the dictionary a lot simpler. :P
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| Friday, July 11th, 2008
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11:24 am - Overdue Remodeling
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I hadn't changed my journal layout in ages, and I was starting to get a little sick of it. As before, I had used anime characters or video game characters as the subjects of my icons, now I wanted to use World of Warcraft stuff, for the fun of it. And I came up with the idea of making class icons that include a fitting quote from somewhere.
So there it is, my poorly-made Warlock icon. I know it looks a bit like crap, but that IS my own level 70 warlock on there, casting "Drain Soul." And the quote is the absolutely wonderful line by Dr. Orpheus of The Venture Brothers from the excellent "Trial of the Monarch" episode. So if you can read the tiny writing on there... enjoy that.
Yes, I know, I have too much time on my hands.
On a completely unrelated note, I have a feeling it's gonna be tough for me to watch Slayers Revolution at the rate of one episode per week. That's something I'm just not used to with Slayers. I hope it's a good series, though. It's decent so far, and Xellos hasn't even shown up yet. ;) So here's hoping.
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| Friday, June 27th, 2008
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10:54 am - Musical Interlude
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Music meme from ![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) arashikurobara
1. Reply to this post and I'll assign you a letter.
2. List (and upload, if you feel like it) 5 songs that start with that letter.
3. Post them to your journal with these instructions.
EDIT: The links are currently not working, so don't be surprised if you can't download. If I find a way to make it work, I'll edit this entry again.
My letter today is... R
1. Acid Black Cherry - Rakuen
2. High and Mighty Color - Rejisutansu
3. Origa - Rise (From Ghost in the Shell, Stand Alone Complex, Season 2)
4. Janne da Arc - Romance
5. Luna Sea - Rosier
Hm, this ended up being disproportionately J-rock. And yeah, there's a Janne da Arc song AND an Acid Black Cherry song up there, but come on. They're completely separate bands (even if it is the same lead singer...)
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| Sunday, June 15th, 2008
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2:07 pm - Not that I'm complaining, but...
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I've never quite understood what exactly people base the claim upon when they describe me as "kind" or "sweet." Especially if they're people who don't really know me very well. I mean, as far as I know, I don't go out of my way to be nice to people, for the most part. But it's not like I go around treating people like crap either.
Basically, I don't typically describe myself as being "nice" or "mean" or anything. There isn't really a word on the spectrum of kindness that I feel really "defines" me so I don't use it to describe myself. But apparently some people do.
So all I'm really wondering is this: Is the quality of not being intentionally mean to others just about the only prerequisite for kindness?
(I guess what this says about human nature and social psychology is that when people evaluate others, they generally give them the benefit of the doubt. They'll rate them as all-around "good" people unless they see evidence to convince them otherwise. Which, I have to admit, makes perfect sense to me, based on what I already know of social psychology.)
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| Sunday, June 8th, 2008
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12:18 pm - On the subject of the New
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You would think that when uncommon events occur in one's life, they might stop to think "Ah, something besides common, everyday, boring things has occurred... I should blog about it." Which is exactly what I do think. But then I procrastinate, wait several days, and lose all motivation to bother saying anything because, let's face it, it's old news by then. Sure, no one has heard about it and thus to all of my readers here, it would, in fact, be new news... but to me it seems so pointless to talk about that unless I bring myself to make a post right away, such occurrences are destined to become nothing more than memories in my mind that only resurface when someone asks, "So what have you been up to lately?" and I reply, "Oh nothing. Wait... did I tell you that this interesting thing happened two months ago? 'Cause it did."
Therefore, you might like to know that between the time I last posted and now, I had... a Cedar Point trip, a graduation, a birthday, and most recently, an annoying power outage. But I'm not going to discuss any of those things right now because, like I said, they're starting to be "old news" in my mind and there's actually surprisingly little to say about any of them. So instead I'll talk about something a little more new.
And that something is the fact that I have a new computer. Sort of. Actually, it was my brother who got a new computer, but as you may or may not already know, our family has an established system of technological hand-me-downs. In other words, whenever my brother gets a new computer or computer component, if it is better than that which I have, 90% of the time, his old computer component goes to me. My old computer components usually go to my parents' computer. Thus, my brother has a beautiful piece of sophisticated technology, I have the slightly-older but still effective system, and my parents get a composite of older parts, somewhat akin to a digital Frankenstein monster, that nevertheless works just fine for their purposes.
So my new computer, otherwise known as Greg's old computer, is certainly an upgrade from my old one (it has 2 GBs of RAM, for one, although Greg's new comp has 4), and currently has Windows Vista installed on it. We copied most of my data onto the new hard drive, installed a few huge programs (the rest is up to me), and set everything up in my room. Making the switch is a long, grueling process, and there are benefits and annoyances regarding the whole thing. So here is a list of my complaints and my praises regarding the new computer.
Complaints:
1) I still have to install a bunch of little programs, which will mostly be done on a need-to-use basis. Still, it's annoying that I'll have this period of time where I'll have to think, "I should get on AIM... oh right... I have to redownload and install it."
2) Getting used to the new takes some time. Specifically, I need to get used to Vista and all the tiny little changes in it. And since I'm reinstalling many of my programs, I'll be getting the most updated versions of many of them (because I'm really bad about updates) and I'll have to get used to those as well.
3) My N64 emulator doesn't seem to work. It opens, but it crashes when it attempts to load any ROM. Fortunately, my laptop, which still has XP and already has the emulator on it, can be used to play it. Even though the laptop is old and a piece of crap, the emulator isn't really graphic-intensive or anything and I believe it plays just fine. So if I really want to replay Ocarina of Time for the millionth time, I do have a way to play it even if I can't get the emulator to work on my desktop. My SNES emulator seems to work, but it likes to give me about 5 error messages before finally deciding to open up the ROM directory.
4) When I was copying files from Greg's external hard drive to my computer, Vista decided to be stupid and told me that certain files were under the same name and tried to get me to replace one with the other. Despite the fact that both of the files were SEPARATE on the external and by the way, did NOT have the same name at all, nor were they the same size even, and a monkey could tell you that they are different files, Vista insisted that they were the same. I just copied both and renamed the files that were causing trouble, but it was certainly an annoyance.
Praises:
1) Obviously, it's an upgrade in general. And Vista is shiny, just takes getting used to.
2) As I said before, I'm bad about updating my applications, so this will be a good chance for me to get the latest versions of everything I use.
3) In regard to the previous comment, I should also note that I had never before bothered to get Firefox on my computer, because I was used to IE and it didn't bother me in any way and even though I kind of wanted to get Firefox, I was too lazy to actually do so. However, Greg put Firefox 3.0 Release Candidate on this thing and I plan to get used to the browser and use it almost exclusively, because it is wicked-fast.
4) With its graphic settings turned all the way up (something I hadn't done before), WoW gets framerates between 45 and 60 FPS on average. I still need to see what I get in a highly-populated area like Shattrath, but I imagine it won't go below 30 for the most part. So smooth...
So overall, once I get used to all the little things and restore all my programs and applications, I'll be perfectly happy. This computer was Greg's birthday present to me, actually. Or more specifically, his excuse not to get me a separate present, 'cause I'm sure I would have gotten this computer regardless. But I'm not complaining.
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| Friday, May 9th, 2008
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10:34 am - The recent past and the near future
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Over the past month or so, I've been extremely busy and my sleep has mostly consisted of 2-4 hour increments during odd hours of the day. I'm not really complaining much though, because I fully understand that I forced myself into that situation. Slacking off for most of the semester inevitably means forcing yourself to work hard and catch up in the last portion of it. If you judge my level of busy-ness by the amount of time I spent playing WoW during a particular period, this last month would make you think, "Geez, you really have been busy, haven't you?" because I've barely played WoW lately. Granted, I've been finding other ways to keep myself entertained and procrastinating *coughDiablo2cough* (which is why I always claim that it isn't WoW that makes me lazy, because even without WoW, I'd just find something else to play for hours on end). WoW just tends to take longer commitments of a given time if you're doing anything with a group (instances, raids, ect.) and I didn't want to take up that kind of time.
But finals are over now, so a certain burden has been lifted. However, I'm going to be fairly occupied for another week, and after that, I'm not sure what my schedule will be like. But hopefully I can at least somewhat relax now.
As it stands, I'm going home in a few hours, taking half of the stuff in my dorm room with me so as to minimize the car load for when I actually move out completely. I'll be home until Wednesday, when I will return to Cleveland via bus, which will be an interesting experience as I have never actually traveled anywhere alone before. Thursday is a Cedar Point trip, which I am looking forward to. There are a number of Senior Week activities going on between now and Commencement, but this was the only one I was interested in. And then Commencement is on Sunday, after which I'll be moving out and going home.
And then I just have to look for work. I haven't really had a lot of time to do much job searching lately, so I haven't found anything yet. But I'm glad to have a little bit of a break between now and then (whenever "then" happens to be), especially if I'm going to have to relocate somewhere for the job and need to make the necessary living arrangements.
As nice as it will be to go home for a little while, I somewhat wish I didn't have to go anywhere until after Commencement because I'm somewhat worn out from finals and haven't had much of a chance to recuperate, but I have to pack half my stuff already. I also won't be able to catch up on sleep quite as easily at home since my parents somewhat frown on me sleeping past noon. On the other hand, going home does normalize my sleep schedule to reasonable hours, so that's always a plus.
And by the way, I feel way too young mentally for where I am in life right now. It's a scary feeling, seriously. But I think I've always been somewhat behind in social development, so it's not surprising, I guess. Nevertheless, I feel that all the intelligence and wisdom I possess (which I've felt lately hasn't been as much as I thought I had) cannot prepare me for real life. So I hope I will not fare too horribly. But we all muddle through somehow, so I'm sure it'll work out in some way or another. It just might take a little while. Heh.
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(3 comments | comment on this)
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| Tuesday, March 4th, 2008
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7:44 pm - I am what I am
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| Wednesday, January 16th, 2008
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10:44 am - An Aside: World of Warcraft
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Sometimes I really hate the social aspect of WoW. And I'm not referring to the fact that the realms are populated with the typical gaggle of idiots and whenever you talk to someone or group with someone or someone talks to you, you never know if it's going to be someone mature and intelligent or someone with both the intellect and mannerisms of an obnoxious 10-year-old. I'm also not referring to guild drama, which by the way, is one of the most annoying things to deal with in any guild.
Most of what I refer to is psychological and probably just a combination of my emotions and my paranoia. Still, there are numerous reasons why I don't really like end-game raiding, even though I now put myself through it anyway. (It's an interesting experience, to be in a large, organized group of 25 people all working toward the same goal. Still, before the expansion came out, I refused to try raiding, even though I had several level 60 characters. Partly from my lack of confidence and thinking I wasn't good enough and would just hold the entire group back, partly from my social anxieties about being in a group that large, and partly because I preferred to solo-quest and level alts instead.) For me, there's a certain emotional ambivalence that comes from my situation as a raiding player, and sometimes this discrepancy really bothers me.
On one of the servers on which I play, I currently have three level 70 characters, two of whom I raid with: my warlock and my priest. And I am currently in two separate guilds on that server. My warlock is in a high-end raiding guild that has progressed quite well and is one of the top guilds in the server. Though that guild takes raiding quite seriously, there's still a somewhat laid-back attitude that makes it stand out from some other guilds, where everyone has to be a hardcore player and care only about the game and devote all their free time to raiding with the guild. In this guild, we do 25-mans like SSC and TK regularly, and have all the lower content on farm status. Since I would label myself as a "casual raider," I only attend raids with that guild about 2-3 days a week at most (part of this is also my lack of availability on some raid nights, but I wouldn't want to raid any more than that anyway... but that's also assuming I get picked to go on all the days I sign up, which I don't. Lately I haven't been picked at all). Since I don't have as strong of a commitment to raiding, I am not as experienced or skilled or well-geared as other members of the guild, but when I am in a raid, I do my job and help with whatever I can do.
Still, within this guild, I can't help but feel hopelessly inferior to everyone else. Not just because my gear is worse since I don't have the attendance to get the best 25-man gear, but also in skill-level. And for some reason, I always feel like everyone else in the raid either ignores me completely or takes a condescending attitude toward me because I'm not among the really "good" players in the guild. I enjoy being a part of the guild and I enjoy running high-end raids on occasion with them, but I always just feel like I'm not good enough to be in this guild and the only reason I haven't been kicked out is that I haven't done anything WRONG and they don't kick people for doing nothing, but that if I did leave, no one would be sad to see me go.
My priest raids in a much more casual guild. In this guild, we don't have a lot of well-geared level 70s, so we just run the 10-man Karazhan and we've only cleared it halfway so far. In this guild, I feel exactly the opposite way from how I do with my warlock's guild. Here I feel like I have a lot to offer and like I have good skill and knowledge and that I actually contribute something to the group. (I'm also an officer in this guild, so I try to make informative forum posts on their website as well.) And it's not just because of my experience from high-end content with my other guild... even before I joined that guild, I made efforts to get the best possible gear for myself before running Kara and I knew a lot about the game from having leveled so many different characters over the course of my play-time.
Like I said before, I really hate the discrepancy between these two. My priest's guild makes me feel like I'm actually a pretty good player, and then I go run something with my warlock and suddenly I feel completely worthless compared to everyone else there, as if the skill I thought I possessed was no more than an illusion. (Heh, it's like when I played Soul Calibur II with my brother and he was the only person I'd ever played against and he used to beat me most of the time, so I thought I wasn't very good. However, he always told me, "If you played against other people, like my friends, you'd probably kick their butts." And when I did finally play against some other people, I found that I was actually pretty decent.) Still, I know I'm a fairly good player. Not too many people really have the skill to be successful in high-end raiding guilds, and I know that. It's just hard to not compare yourself to those at the top, when you're in the position of "the worst of the best." And I tend to be in that position a lot, in many aspects of my life.
My other problem is, since I prefer solo-questing in WoW, I play as sort of a "jack of all trades, master of none" fashion, where I have five level 70s (soon to be more) but few of them are well geared and none are in full epics or anything, whereas there are people who only have one level 70, but that character has the best loot available. Problem is, people judge you on how many epics you have, not how many characters you leveled all the way to 70. So even though I spent as much or more time and effort with what I've accomplished in-game, I still don't get as many "oohs" and "ahhs" as those people who have one really powerful 70. I guess I'm like an author who's written 20 decent books but who still pales in comparison to another author who wrote one bestseller and became famous and made millions.
So my point is that I don't really know how to feel. And yes, it is "just a game." And I fully agree with that. Which is why I said in the beginning that I sometimes hate the social aspect of it. Because it often makes you feel like you're being judged by the other players and that you have to prove yourself in some way.
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(3 comments | comment on this)
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| Tuesday, January 15th, 2008
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12:56 pm - Hypothesis
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My morning classes (9:30 on MWF, 10:00 on TR) are ones that pretty much require attendance. Not in a "if you miss more than X classes you automatically fail" kind of way; more of a "if you miss class, it will be noticed and it WILL affect your grade" kind of way. This will either motivate me to wake up on time and attend and help me do well... or it will make me fail miserably.
Any positive attendance trends during the first part of the semester should be disregarded, as I always have a period of time at the beginning of a semester during which I attend all my classes which ranges from 1 week to 1 month. I am always subject to the terrible flaws of extreme laziness ("I don't want to get up and walk through snow and cold for 20 minutes just to sit through an hour of lecture"), overconfidence ("if I just read the book a few hours before the test, I'll be fine even if I didn't go to lectures, right?"), and resignation ("I've already missed all these classes in a row and fallen behind... what difference will it make if I miss a few more?").
On a different note, I wonder if having nothing but social science and humanities classes this semester will be a good thing or an annoying thing. I think I'm going to be doing a lot of writing this term. Fun times.
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