Archive for December, 2007
December 13, 2007 at 7:19 pm · Filed under I am feeling...
My day has been a series of technical problems unrelated to my actual problem at hand but large enough that I feel like I have accomplished nothing among my list of things to do.
My laptop is running slowly and it seems to make my mind run slower too.
I had a job interview over the phone last week which I think I bombed when it came to the abstract logic and algorithmic problems. It reminded me of my days in the “gifted program” when we did “stories with a hole” problems. Me, never solving one, wondered why I was there. I think I eventually dropped out. I’m a gifted school drop-out.
I am stressed about finding work this winter.
I am stressed about finishing my thesis.
I am stressed that the work I have done this past fall is not really a contribution to any of the bigger picture.
I need a hug. I know I am lucky to have people cheering me on. But right now they are either far away or close but I can’t afford the time to see them.
Christmas is coming and it is motivating me to move along because soon I will see my family and close friends in Regina. But sometimes I worry that once I’m in that light at the end of the tunnel, I’ll still be blinded by all the things I feel I need to do.
I want to be uber-productive right now but I’m so wound up that it’s just working backwards.
What’s the best choice from here?
a) try try try you’ll get by
b) let yourself not do programming / thesis work for the rest of the night to start fresh in the morning
c) talk to someone - (about what?)
I’m going to karate. It might help me de-stress or someone might hit me the wrong way and the string will snap and tears will come (mine).
Then I have to prepare for a Christmas party I’m hosting tomorrow night. It is stressful as time is short but at least the work is well-defined cleaning, shopping, baking, and cooking activities that I know I can do and enjoy. Well….except the cleaning part.
Explode!
December 9, 2007 at 11:58 pm · Filed under In the Kitchen and Foodstuff
After getting fitted for an almost free custom made mouthguard by a dentist who is SUPER generous and cares about the teeth of the members at his son’s dojo (Mr. Dentist thank you again so much), I went for ramen with two friends from the club. We went to Motomachi Shokudo on Denman. I * think * it’s new and I * think * it’s run by the same chef who is at Kintaro.
To get my negative comments out of the way, I thought it was too pricey ($8.xx - $10.xx per bowl) and not greasy or salty enough. Though some might find the latter a plus.
Other than that, my favourite things: the smell of the restaurant (a smell that let’s you know ramen is being cooked there), the food presentation (its oishisoh-ness), and the texture of the noodles (firm).
I recommend, but actually, I have not gone to Kintaro yet and I think I might like it there more because I hear it’s cheaper and (on flickr) see that there may be more variety and it might be greasier. Actually, after some research I am learning that Motomachi uses chicken broth for a lighter, more “exquisite” taste. That makes sense then - the ‘oink’ was missing.
December 6, 2007 at 12:53 pm · Filed under Flashback
I was just looking up at my ceiling, wondering why nothing is showing up in my outline of my newly imported into Eclipse jython project and I noticed the faint outlines of six stars in a row. Are those for me? Stars for finally installing the JyDT plug-in for Eclipse and getting something to run? The stars are all over my ceiling. Those glow-in-the-dark ones but I would not have noticed them at night because they have been painted over.
Question: if a glow-in-the-dark sticker is painted over, does it still glow?
I’m guessing no because the phosphors cannot be energized by anything.
Today is a day of discovery and realization. Before reading this BoingBoing post, it had never occurred to me that skill testing questions are not normal and that they do not exist outside of Canada. I thought it was just the thing to do when you win a contest. Just one last hurdle to the prize.
Why do we really have them? From wikipedia:
The combined effect of Sections 197 to 206 of the Canadian Criminal Code bans for-profit gaming or betting, with exceptions made for provincial lotteries, licensed casinos, and charity events. (…) These organizations take advantage of the fact that the law does allow prizes to be given for games of skill, or mixed games of skill and chance. In order to make the chance-based contests legal, such games generally have mathematical skill-testing questions incorporated.
I think I remember having an argument with my older brother when I was really really young. We were using the skill-testing-question as as measure of our intelligence and I claimed that my answer, different from his, was right thus I must be more intelligent.
My dad had to break the news that I was wrong and I just couldn’t figure out why. The question was so simple. But this was before learning about the use of parenthesis and order of operations. Actually, after writing that, I got this vague memory of a 5-10 minute period where dad said my answer was right, even though it was not.
I also remember feeling anxiety answering skill-testing questions. Like, everything to win could fall into place but if I got this wrong (shakes fist at self)…
December 5, 2007 at 1:00 am · Filed under Random Thoughts
It was Christmas time two days ago. Now it feels like spring.
I’ll never be able to comprehend this time of year anywhere outside of Saskatchewan.
I think all I have are these photos. This was my day. I woke up, ate breakfast and coded, jogged, showered, went to the uni, coded, had a meeting, coded, went to a cafe, coded, went to karate, came home, coded. I’m in a groove.
I’m liking Python.
Thursday is St. Nick’s day. Please leave cookies and oranges out for the people you live with. Or…make sure you leave your boots out on Wednesday night.
December 2, 2007 at 8:58 pm · Filed under Theeeeeeeeeeesis
It started snowing yesterday and then it might have stopped overnight. I don’t know, I was cooped up * trying * to work on thesis.
This morning it was coming down in slow puffs like dandelion fluff in the sky. I watched from inside the kitchen and it made my heart feel all warm inside. It was good but…I felt some frustration because there was no outlet for that happy coziness. I wanted to bake cookies but it wouldn’t be good to take the time and even if I did I’d probably eat them all while writing.
I did go for a walk in the afternoon. The snow reminded me of Saskatchewan (of course), but I was in Vancouver, but Vancouver hidden in a blanket of snow, disguised as Saskatchewan maybe. I sort of felt like I wasn’t in either place. I’m just in some dimension and I can’t leave until I finish my thesis.
Sorry for being such a big sigh but….BBLLAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRGH!!! I wish I was done. Where are my ruby slippers?
I have 4 mini sections (maybe 2 pages of single spaced writing), half of my concluding contributions and a future work section left before I can say my draft is done. The trouble is that 2 of those mini sections feel really complicated and shaky. I know, I should do the easy ones for now. But I tried to attack one of the hard mini sections and it knocked me out of the ring. Gotta get back in.
December 2, 2007 at 12:57 am · Filed under Dreams
This dream was probably influenced by an episode of Buffy that I watched a bit before going to bed. It was truly the creepiest and one of the best episodes that I have seen thus far. But influenced by pre-zzz-tv or not, I think this dream should score some imagination points. It could be made into an episode of Buffy. Or some other tv show that needs a packaged “descending evil + remedy” design.
The evil that descends upon the town I live in:
I am out and about, many people are around. They seem almost normal but many are strangely clustered in groups. They walk around with no expression, like zombies but without the blood and dead skin tones. They are still alive but seem to have no purpose. Groups of 5 to 10 people wander together.
I come to understand that a person becomes one of these zombies immediately after contact with a group of them but only if they are dressed in the same colours as the pack. I see a group of 3 in pastel orange descending on a confused girl in an pastel orange sweater with large white polka dots. Without a mess, she soon has the same dazed look as the rest.
I become a zombie but my dream self just doesn’t really care. It’s fine not caring. I’m wandering around with the group in gray. Occasionally, I see the image of a man’s face flashing in my head. I come to understand (because part of me is going through the zombie motions but another part watching over it all) that all these people are trapped in colour-coded heartache of the past. They travel in their groups of blues, reds, and purples, without free thought, only with images of someone they lost before they changed.
The remedy:
I’m thinking about dead ends. A person would take a few steps forward, stop at an invisible wall, and then step back, re-routing their aimless path. Like a dead end. Then I come to understand that dead ends are the remedy. I find a three meter recess in a pale yellow wall and walk inside, continuing until I hit the wall and * poof * I am not a zombie anymore. I guide another to walk into the wall.
We leave marks behind on the wall. There is a thin burnt outline where my face made contact - it is the image of the man I had in my head. I look behind at some people who seem to be watching my dream with me. “Is this Zorro? It looks like Zorro, there’s the ’stache and dark eyes…why was I in love and then trapped in heartache over Zorro?”
December 1, 2007 at 1:21 pm · Filed under Reading
I probably won’t finish the book I mentioned I was reading, In Patagonia. It is supposed to be one of the great “accounts of travels” book but, it’s just not engaging me. I think because of the high content of names: people and places with little sense of “this is going somewhere”. I’m bad with remembering names and specifics and I read the book with anxiety that I should be able to keep track of everything. But…I don’t think I need to. He is traveling, he will meet people, and then never see them again. That’s a beauty of travel. But I can’t shake the feeling that I am supposed to remember it all so that I can understand some point that he might make in the end.
So I pulled a different book from the Kommune library, Nabokov’s Dozen, thirteen short stories by Vladimir Nabokov, famous for writing Lolita. I think I will read that next. I am really enjoying the short stories. I love the style he uses to describe things, and also his choice of extra description / telling of events not necessarily needed to contribute to the sense of the story but they are attractive, you relate to them, and it pulls you in.
Some favorite lines:
It half slipped down from one of those vestibule chairs which are doomed to accommodate things, not people.
He slept badly the night before the departure. And why? Because he had to get up unusually early, and hence took along into his dreams the delicate face of the watch ticking on his night table (…)
December 1, 2007 at 11:59 am · Filed under Thinking
I have notes. I actually have a list of things that I want to write about. They’ve been building up in this time of so many things crucial for me to be writing: thesis, documentation of my work in the lab this fall, cover letters, correspondence with potential new roommates, portfolio, complaint letters…
Yes, I wrote a complaint letter the other week. It contained bits like “incurring serious injuries” and “not at an adequate level of safety”. Besides there being an issue that needed to be addressed on behalf of many people, it was really good personal experience writing the letter - wanting to make a point that is taken seriously with action not defense. I could further develop this skill by writing another letter, maybe this time to Translink about bus drivers that talk on the mobile while driving. Really?!
But there are other forms of writing that need exercise and I am in wonder over what an art it is - not literature writing art but the technique needed to craft documentation and correspondence and so on. To have a purpose and something specific that you want to change inside the reader as he/she goes from beginning to (you hope) the end.
Yesterday I was surprised to find a card addressed to me in the mail. By the names and address on the envelope, I guessed who it was from (a couple I only met once) and what it likely was about (coming to my home on Halloween, when I first met them) quickly and my social behaviour assumptions had me thinking it was a thank you card but even then, I was in disbelief that people would send a thank you card after coming over once and thought there might be something else to it. Did they forget something? Did they have a question? Was it a general invitation to some event?
No it was just a thank you card. A beautiful design on the front, blank inside save for two entries, four sentences each, written in different coloured inks. They thanked me for having them over, for the good time, made a joke in references to an event during that evening, and the no obligations request for me to let them host me sometime. So cool and graceful. I felt happy and connected - and I didn’t think it was weird and this is good to know because…
…now is a time for me to connect with people I don’t know well and to stay in touch with those I have gotten to know. Though I often hesitate to communicate because I worry about the burden of my words. Do they have the time? Can they spare the distraction? Are they emotionally available? And so on…
Task: Make a list of all the people I want to contact about something but am avoiding. Then contact them.
Geez….I even hesitated to write that last line.
