(warning: particularly old content) I don't ask for it to make sense 
11/27/02
Sigh. I have cause to be thankful today for my separation of data and operation. Chiyo's primary hard drive failed today—it was very depressing when X seg faulted... and it just went down from there. Thankfully, there was very little information of use on that drive. All of my artwork, mp3s, etc were on the older, 16 gig drive. I lost some notes to myself on mp3s I wanted, my CD listing, and several useful scripts I'd written, but very few papers and the like. Somewhat ironic that it was the two-year-younger drive that failed, but the other really was only used for data storage, and didn't get zapped in the latest power outage. I should have known something was up when it started clicking horribly yesterday, but I didn't make it close enough to the computer in time to tell if it was a hard drive or a fan making the clatter. Today, though, with the drive hanging half out of Chiyo's guts while Brandon and I tested bootability, the terrible grating noises were a little more easy to pinpoint. Argh. I guess I'm stuck in Windows until Christmas, at least. Bother.
AUGH! Six hours after the fatal event, I suddenly remembered the single important thing that was on that drive—ALL of my old email from 1997 on. AUGHHHHHHHH. Perhaps I'll try a little harder to retrieve some of the information there.
11/26/02
It took a couple days before I got a chance to read the article the BBC was running about the origins of dogs. Pretty neat stuff, despite the article being so short, but most interesting was the sidenote about a study where dogs, even puppies as young as 9 weeks old, outperformed chimpanzees in social-cueing tests. Basically, even the stupidest puppy you've ever seen could outperform an adult chimpanzee at figuring out what you're trying to tell it to do. I wonder if they've tried the test with wolves... it'd be interesting to try to determine whether it's an ability that's been intensified through our breeding programs.
11/25/02
Well, power is back on at my apartment after two days of only two walls working (thank god, one wall included the outlet connected to the fridge). Of course, all my stuff is still up here at Jim's, so I suppose I'm braving the 372 tomorrow morning. Not so happy.
Silly Japanese word of the next test I'm studying for!
danchi—public housing development
11/24/02
Nothing spoils a good evening like having to get up around 6:30 the next day and having to perform a skit that one has lost the script for. Tomorrow will be "fun."
(Edited 02/26/07 to update links to the switch ads, as they appear to no longer be available on the Apple sites)
Today, I discovered the Japanese switch ads on Apple's site. Takekura Hiroatsu is the CUTEST! Just to piss off John, of course. Heh. Though the best switch ad so far, by a huge margin in my mind, has to be Janie Porche. I mean, come on—she's adorable AND she saved Christmas! What is there not to love??
11/22/02
I wish I knew why I so often get depressed on Friday nights. It's certainly not EVERY Friday night; yet a significant number of Friday nights over the past five years or so have been on the down side. I leave Gowen 301, pace out to a bus stop, and try not to cry in front of the Metro-riding public, get home, and just sit miserably. Maybe it's all the time in the dark, I don't know. I've spent the last two or three hours downloading music obsessively as a way to avoid true thought about the whole thing. I always wish that Jim would randomly come by and visit... he calls sometimes on these nights, but not usually unless we've set up something prior. Of course, I wish he'd do that in general. I feel so much of the time like the burden is upon me to keep everything going. Admittedly, I'm being somewhat selective in my memory, which upsets me when I notice it. Then I think to myself, it should mean something that I feel that way regardless... and then I remember that I'm just being neurotic and needy and get annoyed. Bother. Heh—that was about the least-flowing paragraph I've written in a long time.
11/21/02
I was going to write something about my grudging respect for Eminem (not based on 8 mile, I've not seen it yet) but I didn't get around to sitting down here until near 2 am, and "I'm tired." I've been up since 6:30. Sniffle.
11/20/02
Today, I'm school-related happy! REALLY HAPPY! I've been asked from on high to keep it on the d/l, though, so I can't go posting my heart out. But I'll be damned if I'm not as happy as I've been school-wise since I got accepted into grad school. What can I say? It's been a good day.
Silly Japanese word of the next test I'm studying for!
fudoushousuuten—floating point decimal
11/19/02
Today, I woke up at 7, scrambled out the door to catch my bus, went to class, caught a 9:30 bus back home, and was back asleep by 10. And woke up at 2:45 this afternoon. I feel... somehow off.
My dad is all stoked because I got a chemistry-related internship. I'm not really surprised, but I wish I was confident that he'd have been just as happy if I'd gotten a non-technical one. But he wouldn't have... and people wonder why I don't value my non-technical skills. Years of training, years of training.
11/18/02
Internship for Jen with Sumitomo Chemical's Process and Production Technology Center! Details on when exactly I leave are still sketch, but "sometime in June" is close enough. Most hilarious, though, is what their original offer that I applied for looked like:
Field of Internship/Fellowship:
Chemical Engineering
Proposed Scope of Internship/Fellowship in Detail:
Main Theme:
Physical behavior of particles in liquid/air in chemical processes
-Particle size measurement and theoretical analysis-
Explanation of Main Theme:
In chemical industrial processes, it is easy to understand physical phenomena of pure gas/liquid. To the contrary, in the case of two phases including colloidal particle suspensions, particles flowing in air, bubbles in liquid, it is too difficult to analyze the phenomena theoretically. Recently, we can measure easily the change in size of particulate materials/bubbles in processes with time using on-line measurement system (e.g. FBRM system produced by LASENTEC, USA). We can collect a large number of the data of particle size because we have the same. However, it is still difficult to analyze the obtained data theoretically. Therefore, we would like to carry on the measurement and the theoretical for the following themes:
- Dispersion of aggregate particles in liquid in a stirred vessel.
- Segregation of particles having a broaden size distribution in a hopper due to discharge flow.
- Evaluation of batch cooling crystallization.
- Bubble homogenization in a stirred vessel.
It is desirable that applicant should understand daily conversation. But it is not mandatory.
Desired Educational Background and/or Work Experience of Interns/Fellows :
Applicant should have or should be obtaining Master of Science or Ph. D. in chemical/Mechanical Engineering. In addition, applicant should have great skill in computer programming.
I almost didn't apply for this one, because it seemed so far out of my league, scientifically speaking... Jen was not the best student of chemistry ever. And they actually OFFERED it to me!! Boggle. Six months in Osaka with room and board paid for and a stipend of about a grand a month... dance!
A new installment : silly Japanese word of the next test I'm studying for!
seishokuki—reproductive organs
Because I REALLY need to know the clinical term for this.
11/17/02
I wish I had money to contribute to c89's pledge drive for On The Edge (the best Sunday night radio in town). However, considering that I've pretty much figured out that I'll only be up ~600 dollars by the end of June once I account for rent, utilities, and tuition, I'm restricting myself to a budget. This budget still far outstrips what meager profit I'll be making in the next six months, but at least I won't dip too deeply into my savings. Sigh. It would have helped if I hadn't laid nearly 40 bucks on tickets and drinks last night (heh). I'm left about seven dollars until next week—serves me right. That's not even enough to get coffee more than two days this week.
11/16/02
I think that going to a rave, getting drunk, and dancing for about four hours straight was EXACTLY what I needed. Extra props to the guy grinding me who made Jim jealous, the girl with dreads who thanked me for sharing the love, and the guy in the grey sweatshirt who discreetly danced with me so that Jim didn't notice. I only write that last bit because I'm still pretty buzzed. Whoo.
11/15/02
I basically didn't eat for three days this week. I forced myself to eat tonight out of a sense of self-ridiculousness, but now I'm just rather wishing I was of the disposition to just go throw it up.
11/14/02
Grr. Back in pain. Lots. Sobness.
11/13/02
I've never posted on Slashdot much (cough, twice, cough), but hey, at least one of the times was "sweet." This is quite old (I think it's from 2000 or so) but I still think it's funny—it's regarding the closing of the Wizards of the Coast store a couple years back.
"Crown Jewel" indeed.
Personally, I thought the place was a hole. Yes, I have several good memories of years spent in the downstairs, meeting up with friends for games of all sorts, but once I moved out of the "heavy scene," and lost my rosy glasses, I saw the place for what it was—the previously mentioned hole. They hired my brother—treated him like crap. They operated a restaurant—which sold ridiculously overpriced food complete with surly service. The Ave rats darting in and out were a much bigger detractor to the "atmosphere" than the lighting; it was a sad day when I saw them lined up in the store, buying their allotment of Pokemon packs to pass them to the frothing parents outside in exchange for a buck. I'm glad it's closed; I was mightily tired of having to defend that place just because it was a gaming establishment. The place served as a poster child for the world-at-large to point at and say "That's what's Wrong with gaming, darnit!" That's not the kind of image that we gamers, geeks and nerds want to be putting forth; here's to the small community gaming store coming back into vogue in Seattle—the places where we can take our parents/friends/significant others and show them that gamers don't have to be dirty and Satanic. No offence to the Satanists. ;)
11/12/02
So tired. Teach me to not be able to go to sleep. Um... it rained a lot today. Whenever I was outside. That didn't make me happy. Other than that, well, I've been up since around 6:30 am and I'm exhausted, so nada. So ridiculous, the empty wisps I pass off as updates on the sleepy days.
Wow. In a rare turn of events, I remembered something I was thinking about earlier. So it was pouring as I walked to school from the Ave today, resulting in one of my single biggest pet peeves. I hate it... HATE IT! when raindrops get all over the lid to your coffee cup and then you tip it up to drink and the drops dribble down and splash your nose and lips. It's the exact worst combination... the wonderful warm coffee getting all ruined by cold bits of water running down and beading on your upper lip. And don't get me started on the fucking raindrop that splats on your head, trickles down your forehead, through your eyebrows, down the bridge of your nose, and then dangles there on the tip. Forever. Grrr.
11/11/02
Well, I WOULD have written something last night, but, well, I was reading a book. So there. Went down to Winlock for the weekend, but not much to say about it. Had some good food. Yeah. Figured out that I'm going to be poor as dirt for the next two years. Yeah.
"And then, in the early 90s, musicall genious Vanilla Ice invented rap music!" Heh. I suppose I don't really have much else better to do right now than lie in bed identifying songs based on the first bar or so and remembering snatches of stand-up comedy bits. Excuse typos; I can see the little white bits on the screen which are theoretically lettsr, but even with my glasses, I can't read them across the room. An interesting side-effect of the not-being-able-to-see—I can't really backspace unless I go all the way back to the end of the row because I ccan't really tell where lword breaks are. This last sentence may have been a case in oint—I think I backspaced right, but who knows. Perhaps it'll be an intersting insight, in the morning, as to what sorts of things I commonly mispell. Resess restless restles—I finished my homework early i in the day, stuided a decent amount for the quiz tomorrow, and generaly did what I'm supposed to... but I just can't get myself to calm down. I'm thinking about him, of course. Kate knows why; anyone else desperatly want to know, and you can ask me directly. It's a bit sensitive to be displaying to the world, even with my often proclaimed standard of openness. Blah. Spock is telling me it's highly illogical.
11/09/02
Amazing how difficult it is to update when ATT decrees that your broadband shall not work. Chiyo's got a modem, I guess, but lord knows I haven't used it in forever. Anyway. I slept 11 hours last night. And I went to bed 15 minutes after having woken up from a ~2 hour nap. Whee. No, I wasn't tired. Nope.
11/06/02
Today was one of those wake-up-a-little-late, be-sluggish, barely-get-out-the-door, pull-your-jacket-on-while-you-run-down-the-block, tie-your-shoes-only-once-you're-in-the-embrace-of-Metro, can't-get-coffee-because-you're-sick, take-a-godawful-test-and-then-sit-unproductively-at-work days. Joy. I think I had another class in there, but it didn't really register. At least I got to have dinner with Kate.
It's that time of year when my allergies migrate down into my lungs. For the next several months, I'll be coughing away like I've got consumption. Believe me, I am overjoyed about this. Really. Because it's so cool to be moistly hacking up bits of my insides for months on end. ARGH.
11/05/02
I actually voted today... Rather sad to think that I've had the privledge for five years and have never done so, but I suppose better late than never.
11/04/02
Warning : gross and personal.
So I went looking up stuff on urinary tract infections today. I don't get them very often (horror of horrors, I've learned that some women get them as often as three times a year), but holy SHIT do they suck. It's not so much the pain that I mind... it's the needing to piss ALL THE TIME and only being able to go a little bit at a time. ARRRGGGGHHH. So I found out today that yes, cranberry juice does help (if you're in a home-treating sort of mood), which soothes me somewhat. Apparently, it's not the acidity of the juice that nukes the baddies, which is what I'd been told before, but rather the fact that a component of cranberries (they think it's the mannose) inhibits the ability of nasty stuff to stick to your insides. More depressingly, I learned that if you've gotten one once (this is if you're a woman... men apparently don't get them nearly at all... bastards), you're 20% more likely to get another one; if you've had two, you're 30% more likely to have a third... and if you get a third, well, you're screwed, because 80% of women who have had three UTIs are going to continue to have life-long reoccurences. ARRRGGGGHHHH. Snicker—apparently a way to fend off UTIs is to "not routinely resist the urge to urinate." I can hear a little Brandon-voice over my shoulder...
I figure at least one post a year should have to do with icky bodily stuff... I suppose this fits the requirement. Heh.
11/03/02
It's amazing how some things can look incredibly disgusting (like my grandmother's old German cabbage recipe I dug up tonight) yet taste so incredibly nummy (like my grandmother's old German cabbage recipe I dug up tonight). Of course, kielbasa and bacon never hurt ANYTHING. ANYTHING. Best thing about it is it's one of those dishes that tastes better the longer everything sits together... meaning that my tummy will be quite happy when I get home from school tomorrow afternoon.
Damn, I love food.
11/02/02
I don't know why more people don't like candy corn. Mmmmm... candy corn... Half price candy corn....
11/01/02
I think this is the first time I've switched over on the first of the month in... well, a long time. I'm freaking out about my speech on Monday—I told myself very sternly that I was going to start writing it today, and... um... I didn't. I did start studying the bazillion words I've been theoretically learning over the past four weeks. It boggled the mind. I'm going to have to drag myself out of the house tomorrow and sit my ass at the Roma or something if I hope to get anything productive done. Blah. I did watch Galloping Gourmet with Greg tonight, and lo, it was funny (of course). Which helped, for half an hour, with the forgetting about the midterms and speech thing. I want the Guu and Azumanga Daioh themes. I should have called Kate earlier—EEP. I'm very very tired... could you tell? For funniness (or horror, I suppose, but I do hope that anyone who knows me would appreciate the oh-my-god-I'm-going-to-die humor value) see Happatai—Yatta! (ASX). Do it now.