1.28.2009

Rambling

I should be reading for Psych. But I can do that later...

This will probably surprise most of you (though "most" in this case, if one is referring to the majority of my readers, is like 2 people). I hadn't planned to blog until next month. But I'm bored, and my Xbox is broken.

Soooo... Let's talk about classes. Here's what I'm taking:

Calculus II
Psychology as a Social Science
Data Structures in Java
Music and Politics
Guitar Lessons

I'm pretty happy with my schedule this semester. My classes start at 11 every day, so it's nice not to have to go to bed too early. Especially considering my roommate's sleeping habits. Calc has actually been fairly enjoyable so far. Homework isn't collected, and my professor is far better this semester than last. Plus I already went over most of the stuff in Calc II in high school, so it's basically a semester-long review.

Psych is cool too. There's a shit ton of reading to do, but my professor is pretty kick ass, and the material is interesting (so far). I have heard his tests are usually pretty rough though. So we'll see how that goes.

Data Structures is fun as well. The prof is awesome, unlike last semester. Noonan was a terrible teacher. But this guy actually teaches us how to understand stuff, not just how to write the code for it. So far we're just examining algorithm efficiency, and that's pretty easy to grasp. I guess I finally see how calculus relates to comp sci, but I still don't think it should be a requirement for a major to take so many math classes. Oh well.

Music and Politics is pretty cool. I have the same instructor as I had for Worlds of Music last semester, and I like him. We have a long ass research paper to do, but we basically start it at the beginning of the semester, so hopefully it won't be too bad. We're supposed to pick a piece of music and analyze it's relationship to "politics" (quotes cuz it doesn't mean conventional politics, it's more of a broader definition which includes basically all relationships between people and other people...). I think I'm gonna use "Praise the Lord and Pass the Ammunition" by Serj Tankian. That one should be easy.

Haven't had any guitar lessons yet, so nothing to talk about there.


My Xbox 360 suffered the fatal RRoD a few days ago. I'm really pissed about it. I haven't even had it for a year. 360s have a 30% failure rate. 30%! That's absurd. I'm very very seriously considering getting a PS3. Here's what I think I'll do: I'll send my Xbox in to Microsoft to be replaced, then when I get a new one from them I'll sell it and most/all of my games, controllers, and accesories. Then I should have enough to buy a console. That plus birthday money gives me enough for another controller and a couple of games without having to spend any of the money already in my bank account. I'm also contemplating trying this site and seeing how that goes. Now I know most people look at sites like that and immediately think "scam", but I did get a free Xbox 360 from one of these so-called "scam" sites. So I know they can be legitimate, I just don't know anything about this one in particular. We'll see how that goes.


Anyway, I don't have much else to talk about, so... until next month I suppose.

11.05.2008

Once a month

I'll do my best.

Okay, so... Obama won the election. He's gonna save the universe. Just as soon as he jacks in and beats Smith. Wait, wrong The One.

But seriously. I'm rather happy he's gonna be our president. We've got a majority in Congress too. We'll see, but I'm looking forward to a good 4 (or 8) years. I voted for the first time on Tuesday. It was exciting. I shuttled over with some friends and stood in line for like 10 minutes I got to the front. The lines were really short at 2:30 or so. After we all voted, everyone was like "fuck, what if I accidentally voted wrong, or what if I filled in the bubble wrong, or what if..." which was ridiculous, but entertaining. Then Katie was majorly stressing out for the rest of the day. She kept freaking out, saying "I know he's SUPPOSED to win, but what if he DOESN'T!?" And when Kentucky came in she was like "NO, HE'S AHEAD!" It was terrible. Most people in the lounge watched Stewart and Colbert's Indecision special, which was hilarious. After Virginia went blue, but before they told us, Stewart segued into it by mentioning that he went to William and Mary, and the lounge went crazy. It only got louder when we found out we went blue. Then Tom used it as an excuse to get hugs from girls. Fuckin' creeper. He's convinced everyone loves him and desperately desires his company, when in reality, almost everyone in the building can't stand him. Bleh, he's so annoying. Oh well.

Let's see... what else is important. Not much. I've got a Worlds of Music exam to study for, and it's driving me crazy. I just finished the study guide, and I've been working on it since 5. Next semester I'm taking Psych as a Social Science, Calc 2, Data Structures, and Music and Politics. I'm gonna have classes starting at 11 every day of the week. It's gonna suck. I love my sleeping in :D. But I'll live (I guess... maybe). I've taken to doing homework in comp sci instead of spacing out. Far more productive. Definitely no need to pay attention though. ESPECIALLY when talking about exceptions AFTER doing the lab on it. Her organizational skills are just incredible.

Matt's band Chase the Fall is playing at Virginia Beach next weekend. I've heard them play acoustically and without drums, and their sound is good, but their lyrics are baaaaad. Like, I listen to it, and I just can't believe my ears. I've only heard them play once, so I can't remember specific examples. But it's basically the most cliche generic lyrics you can imagine. Whenver I here them play, I think about how entertaining it would be to listen to with Aleina. She's tear them apart. Oooh, I just remembered something the lead singer said (wasn't in the song, but it was still really funny). He introduced their song, something about a looking glass, and he was like "This song is about looking at yourself in the mirror, examining yourself, about self-inflection." And Sean was like "That's like, the pronounciation of the word 'self'." He went on to sing a song about different ways to pronounce "self". It was hilarious.

I need to get back to studying. Here's November. You should probably remind me at the beginning of December, because I may forget if you don't.

9.04.2008

College

Here you go.

So college. Pretty awesome. Orientation was kinda lame, but cool at the same time. I like that we got to know our hall really well, cuz I'm in the best hall of W&M. We're awesome. But he had to do a bunch of mixers, which were usually really lame. We basically met up with other groups and they forced us to be social, which is all well and good, except that my hall is social enough that the stupid activities we did were totally unnecessary. The first mixer we did was with 2nd upper, and they're pretty awesome. We escorted the ladies to the president's house, where the whole freshman class sang the Alma Mater. Since there are more girls on 2nd upper than guys on 2nd lower, two guys escorted two girls. My roomate and I were those guys. It was pretty cool. We got all dressed up. I was definitely the most classy. But then we had to stand and wait forever for the rest of the freshmen to get there, and for the president to actually come out of his house. So that was really boring. But it was okay. The second mixer was with 3rd upper I think. I don't remember for sure. But all we did with them was take them to lunch at the SC. But there wasn't a whole lot of mixing after we got there. Oh well. The third mixer was with some girls from Dupont. We paired up and each got an egg. Then we used markers to make our egg a person, and made up some facts about him/her. Dory and my egg was named Dwight. He was from the office and liked cheese and haikus. We then proceeded to egg toss our precious babies. They all died. The last mixed was with some Yates girls (Yates sucks by the way. Filled with obnoxious jocks. The girls are tolerable though). We each had a name of a famous person paper clipped to the back or our shirt, and we had to figure out who we were by asking questions. And once we figured it out, we had to find the person we were dating/married to/go with in some other way. I was Ben Affleck. Which was pretty cool, cuz Jennifer Garner is pretty hot. I'm glad I wasn't John Smith or something, cuz Pocahontas was ugly as fuck. And that was it for the mixers.

My class schedule is pretty fuckin' sweet. No classes before noon. Ever. Today my first and only class started at 2. And I have no homework that is due before Monday. It's amazing. But once lessons, quartet, and ultimate club pick up it'll be a little worse. Still very manageable I imagine. Everyone on the ultimate team is ridiculous. It's crazy. I still can't even throw a flick very well. There's a lot that I never knew I was supposed to be doing while playing. I've never counted stalls. I've never stacked. I've never played in shoes... XD. But it's gonna be awesome. They're taking 15 or so for the A team, but everyone gets on B team, so I'm cool with that. I pulled my quad just a little bit into the first practice though, so that sucked. I couldn't do anything other than the throwing drill for the rest of practice. Then today was better, but I tried to sprint and that hurt like hell, so I was really slow the whole time. I got to scrimmage though. Touched the disc twice. But I was only on for 2 or 3 points.

I feel like I'm one of those guys who stays in his dorm most of the day. I go into the lounge and I get comments like "Ben, where have you been? I haven't seen you in forever?" And I'm just like "yeah..." cuz I could go down there more often, but it's usually just people doing work, watching something random on TV, and playing the worst table tennis I've ever seen in my life. Ever. Like, most of them bounce the ball on the table before they hit it for their serve. It's stupid how against the rules that is. There are some good guys though. I do get out a bit though. On weekends most everyone goes over to the frats. One of my OAs is in Kappa Delta Rho, and that's a pretty awesome frat, so I usually go there. He's got like a 40 inch TV in his dorm room. It's ridiculous. Everyone goes to dance parties afterwords though, and that's lame. I don't want to display to the college how white I am. I also don't want some drunk chick's ass all over me. So I usually leave then.

Anyway, this isn't holding my attention anymore. I'm all gross from Ultimate. I don't want to shower though. I think I'll just change and put on some more deoderant. Don't expect frequent posts, even if you bug me about it. But I'll do my best.

6.06.2008

Blaaah

I'm uber bored, and really don't feel like doing anything, so I'm posting. Don't get your hopes up for more in the near future.

So anyway, I feel relatively shitty at the moment. I'm completely physically drained, even though I got 10 hours of sleep. I have a headache for some reason. I've got a fever. It's like 3000 degrees outside, but right now I'm wearing jeans, my hoodie, and am covered in a blanket because I'm freezing and I was shivering like crazy. I asked my mom what was up (she's a microbiologist and all that jazz, so I figured she'd know if it was anything I had to worry about), and she said it's probably just the meningitis vaccine I got yesterday, which makes perfect sense, but still doesn't make me feel any better. But at least that means that's probably why I'm so tired. It sucks feeling so exhausted as soon as I wake up.

On a (somewhat) happier note, this is my last day of "school". Tomorrow I graduate with a bunch of other homeschooled kids in Richmond, then on Sunday is my grad party, then I'll be free. The problem is the only thing I'm motivated to do right now is sit and do nothing. It's balls. But I'll make myself finish everything once I post.

I have to go take senior pictures today. Not looking forward to that. I've already got senior pictures. "But these will be much better. More professional" so my mom says. Still, it's like an hour and a half and I'm not feeling well, so I'd rather just stay home. But oh well. I'll live.

Anyway, that's all I got right now. Sorry it wasn't the most cheery of posts, but I'll do my best to post more often (don't hold your breath for too long though).

4.20.2008

OMG NEW POST :-O

Yep... I'm bored. And I'm procrastinating.

So remember that post way back when? A whole two posts down? About the free Xbox 360? Well I got it. Yep. For free. Well, all-in-all I paid about $50. I'd still say it's a good deal. Thanks to ALL of you who were willing to help (Matt) even if you weren't able to do it in the end (stupid lazy parents).

Anyway, after the 360 I was like "Well why stop now? This is AMERICA. And in America, we like to get new shit." So now I have a laptop for college :). It's niiice. And pretty. Prettier than your laptop. Or yours. I didn't really have any particular people/laptops in mind there, by the way, but I can guarantee mine's prettier. Okay, enough of that.

My parents are pretty enthusiastic about this "turn off the TV week" or whatever (I'll bet only one of you knows what the hell I'm talking about). They've taken it as far as to say "No TV, or computer, or screens of any kind for the whole week". Fuck that. I don't feel the need to prove to myself that I don't need TV or a computer or video games. I hardly have time for any of that as it is. So giving it up for a week would be dumb.

Umm... Spanish proyecto. Sucks. Gotta give it a week from tomorrow, and my group is just getting past the writing part. I'm not all that good at memorizing lines either. We're allowed to use note cards though, so that's good. Our project is gonna kick ass.

Web design is pretty easy though. Last exam (not really the final exam though, because the final "exam" is really just a presentation of our final project) is tomorrow. Multiple choice. Shouldn't be hard. Gotta practice my table and form code today though. Or maybe I'll do it tomorrow after Spanish. We've got a long but really awesome final project. No html (thank you). It's all CSS. I just have to make the page pretty. There are a shit load of divs and classes though, so it'll take awhile. But it'll be fun. If I ever get around to starting it.

Anyway. Gotta go get ready to teach. Fun.

3.18.2008

Senioritis

I has it.

It's pretty bad too. I'm supposed to finish the Great Gatsby today. I haven't started it. I'm also supposed to be going through an AP World History review book. I should be on page 75 or something. Haven't started it either. I'm keeping up with Math, cuz that's easier for mom to check, but I'm looking at the answers the whole way. Physics is so easy I don't really have to do anything anyway... So the only thing I'm actually doing is reading the AP World textbook and doing my BRCC work...

I got a 4-year $8,000 scholarship to Maryland. Too bad I don't wanna go there. It would still be really expensive. I just want to get a decent scholarship to JMU, so I can "decide" formally and give certain people a reason that's acceptable to them.

I don't blog much. Have you noticed? But now that I'm uber-procrastinating, I'm bored and had a random urge to blog. Still don't count on consistent posts though.

I'm in a weird mood (it's not the good kind of weird, unfortunately). There's an epic battle raging in my mind (okay, it's not really that epic...). So far the logical side is probably ahead a little. The logical side is far more reasonable (go figure), but the faulty reasoning and indecisive side isn't out yet. That side isn't as well formed though. Lots of desperate, obviously incorrect assumptions/excuses. But it's still annoyingly present in there, trying its best to convince. And I'm tuning it out, but it's still putting me in a weird mood. I overthink things WAY too much. Meh, I'll get over it.

Joseph and I beat the story mode of Super Smash Bros Brawl on Intense difficulty last night. A total of 12 or so hours of gameplay. Took us 3 days. Yeah. We're awesome. Now I don't have any games to beat though... maybe I'll be motivated to read Great Gatsby tonight since I won't be hanging out. We'll see.

Okay, that's all for my semi-scattered thoughts. I guess I'll go read AP.

2.24.2008

Don't get too excited about this one

I am trying oh so hard to get a free Xbox 360 from this site. Basically I have to refer 9 people, who then complete an offer from the site sponsors (signing up for a trial membership for something usually). The advertisers pay the site, and the site buys whatever it is that you want, then ship it to you (I've researched it enough to know it's legitimate, so that's not my concern right now). SO. If any of you are feeling particularly nice or helpful, or if you have some free time and don't mind spending 5-10 minutes helping me out here, here's what I'd like you to do. Also if you want to get an Xbox 360 for free, you can sign up under my link and start getting your own refs. Follow the link that I'll post at the end of the thread. Sign up for the site after following that link (this entails entering your name, email address, and mailing address) and complete one of the offers. The Stamps.com offer on page 5 is free, but you'll need a credit card, and you'll need to be sure to cancel ONLY AFTER 21 days. Another good one is the Yahoo Success Center on, also on page 5 (this one requires a credit card and cost $1.95). If you complete an offer and I get credit for it, I'll pay you the cost of the offer, unless it's an offer you actually want to try. What you need to make sure to do if any of you actually decide to do this (I'd reeeeally appreciate it...) then be sure to use Internet Explorer, clear your cookies before you do the offer, set your internet settings to "accept all cookies", don't navigate away from the offer page until it has been completed, and when you've finished the offer, wait a few minutes on the final page before you close it. Here's the link: http://www.360Elite4free.com/index.php?ref=4722988

So much for a blog post huh *rolleyes*

Oh, also, if you decide to help me out, make sure you comment me and let me know. I have to keep track of it all.

P.S. You can also use a debit card if you have one of those and you can't use your parents' credit card. And there very well might be offers you are interested in too (they have magazine subscriptions, Netflix, Gamefly, a coffee company, etc.). So if you can find one of those, all the better for you.