I’m sitting on the ncix.com site with my “cart” full of computer goodies, balance at $1600, credit card in hand, and “confirm purchase” button in view. My mouse pointer is sitting over the button, and a single click will result in a much faster computer, and a much lighter wallet.

I’ve been looking at this parts list for days, and everything is flawlessly hand-picked, chosen by process of elimination by reading tons of reviews each arguing perfectly valid, divergent points. Each item in my basket is exactly what I wanted, no more, no less. Thoughts of multitasking on the huge 22″ monitor, playing Bio Shock at high resolutions, and doing video encodes in a matter of minutes flash through my mind.

I get a giddy feeling running up my spine. I’m back to being a kid standing in a toy shop ready to spend my month’s worth of hard earned allowance on the new Star Wars Lego set.

But suddenly, something stops me. This seems familiar. I’ve been through this before. As a kid, was it really what I wanted to spend my money on? Would the Star Wars figures, in all their painted plastic brilliance, bring me the hours of fun and adventure and pure excitement going through my head? No, not likely. I wasn’t looking for Lego at all, actually. I was looking for a way to get the money out of my pockets. At the time, this was called Lego, and came at $20-$60 a package on average.

Now, it has much more complicated names like XFX GeForce 8800 GTS XXX, and Asus P5K-E/WiFi-Solo, and costs about 50 times more, but in truth, I’m still getting the same thing. Something to rid myself of my money. People like me must be a marketing strategist’s wet dream.

Impulse buys are a funny thing. Almost by definition, the buyer doesn’t realize that they don’t need what they’re buying, or what they’re buying doesn’t suit their needs, or that they are about to make the dumbest decision yet in a history of dumb decisions.

But is it our fault? Our minds have become very good at tricking us into thinking that we absolutely need that LED Faucet Light, usually because there’s a mail in rebate. How can we tell when we don’t really need the water from our faucets to glow blue, even when it seems like the greatest idea that will impress our neighbors, make us more attractive, and prevent world hunger?

Here’s how I analyzed it. This requires a pen and piece of paper. Windows Notepad will work just fine as well.

First, write down all the specific benefits your purchase will give you. For example, here’s what I wrote down for my new PC build.

• Increased video encoding time, saving up to half an hour on each render
• Ability to play new games with good image quality
• More space on monitor, making image editing, video editing, and coding slightly easier and faster

That’s all I came up with. The reasons have to be specific, and explain how they help YOU. So for a PC, “faster” is not a benefit, whereas “saving half an hour of encoding time” is. Also, think about whether the product will actually fulfill these perceived benefits. This is best done by researching the product (Google is awesome). If it turns out they don’t do it, then cross ‘em off.

The next step is to write down the price of the purchase, in my case $1600. Now, think about whether you’re willing to pay the asking price for those benefits. The lets you get away from thinking about the nice fancy packaging, the ever so sweet new item smell, and the shiny gloss finish that wasn’t on last year’s model, yet makes no difference in how the product works. It’s important to draw a direct link between the price, and what you get. Not always trivial to do.

In my case, it didn’t take too much thinking to figure out that a bit more screen space, the ability to play a few more games, and saving half an hour every blue moon just wasn’t worth $1600.

I suspect that buying something where the value of the benefits don’t add up to the price of the item is a good way to get some serious buyers’ remorse. Then again, that’s probably a whole other issue. I’d probably have some buyers’ remorse regardless, after being out 1.6 large.

Here’s another example, for inline skate knee pads:

• No scraping knees when falling (happens about every other hockey game for me because I’m not too great at skating ^_^)
• Can skate faster and more confidently
• Added comfort when playing as goalie
• Cost: $30

Had I actually used this when buying a set of knee pads, this would have been a no-brainer. As it stands, I bought those knee pads 2 years ago, and they’ve certainly delivered on their value. Any single one of those benefits would probably be worth the $30 price.

Going back to the PC, I also noticed that some benefits on my list were more substantial than others. In particular, my 15″ LCD monitor salvaged from my parents business from over five years ago really is small, and it’d be nice to have a big, colorful LCD that could fit an entire web page. Not too much to ask, I don’t think.

So another useful exercise to do is to take the important benefits from your original product, and ask yourself whether you can achieve those without spending as much money. It turns out I can get a 22″ LCD for $300. It’s a decent price for a piece of equipment that will likely be used for a good amount of time down the road, longer than the life of a computer.

So what did I end up doing with my planned PC build? I scrapped it. Doing this made me realize that I don’t need a new computer. I’ll wait another year, when the shiny new computer I had planned will already be outdated, and my current one will then be 5 years old. At that time, I’ll go through this process again.

Slowly
More and more
I come to realize
That what we have
Is already perfect

1. Nearly stock
2. Lightly modded
3. Only done the essentials
4. I can go back to stock whenever I want
5. Tastefully modded

September 4th. School starts tomorrow, but I won’t be there. Instead, I’ll be in Gastown, downtown Vancouver, working at Apparent Networks for a second co-op term. It’s really been an interesting last half year for me, so much has happened! I find myself making the most of my time. I’m not sure if it’s just the illusion of being in the moment, but it feels like I’m really getting some stuff done and following through with plans.

Co-op’s been pretty cool. It’s been a learning experience. Most people try to get internships with big name companies, as I did. Google, RIM, nVidia, HSBC, all companies I sent resumes to. I think that had I gotten any of them, the experience would have been unlikely to be as rewarding as what I’ve had with Apparent.

I’ve had my ups and downs in the term, though. Slow, gradual learning curves are frustrating. Motivational slumps are hard to get out of. And the stupid mistakes are just aggravating. Through it all, though, I think I’ve come out with a better understanding of the working world, self-motivation, interpersonal relationships, and oh yes, of course programming.

So I go into the 07-08 winter term with a bright outlook. From here on out, and for the next two years, it’s going to be a hectic alternating schedule between school and co-op. My next six terms looks like this (hopefully): Co-op | School | Co-op | School | Co-op | Break. Things are kinda falling into place. I have a plan in my mind for the remainder of my undergrad degree. What lies beyond, who knows?

So what have I been doing lately… I’ve been making good use of my time, doing as much stuff as possible. Doing the stuff I normally wouldn’t have time for during school terms. I feel like a broken record; I say this during every break, don’t I?

But anyway, lately I’ve been working a lot on my car. I remember saying a year or so ago, I think I’ll just keep it stock, it’s already good that way. Since then: Urethane shift bushings, Urethane motor mount, Synthetic tranny fluid, Autoexe grille, Aftermarket stereo, 323 badge, and Shorty antenna. Short shifter soon to come. They just build up like crazy over time! I should take stock of exactly how much I’ve spent. I’m sure it’ll surprise me. Though it really is pretty much still stock. My philosophy has always been that if it doesn’t look stock, it doesn’t go.

Top indications that you’re a car enthusiast:

1. When you can tell what kind of car is following you at night from the headlight beam patterns, and what kind of car is in front of you from the taillights.
2. When you have a barely resistable urge to change your oil and spark plugs, just for the hell of it.
3. When your car-related conversations last longer than all the others.
4. When you blog about your car.
5. When you describe nice cars or parts as “pure sex”.
6. When you can identify every car on the road by their make, model, and year.
7. When you’d rather listen to the engine sound than the radio.
8. When you do out-in-out within your own lane.
9. When people automatically come to you with car questions.
10. When you get frustrated working on your car and throw the wrench on the ground, and it rebounds off your foot and hits the car, and the first thing you do is check to see if the car’s okay, and then apologize to it for getting mad.

I’ve also been working on a hockey film with a bunch of people. We planned it at the very end of summer, which wasn’t that smart because we eventually ran out of time to film. Creativity doesn’t come on schedule. Luckily we got kinda enough footage, though! It’s been a really fun two weeks. I’ve dedicated so much of my time for it when I could be doing other stuff, but I think it’s worth it and I hope it’s worth it for everyone else when the thing is done, too. Far from done, though. Now I need editing and some better voice and sound samples. I have a feeling I’m going to be returning to sport chek soon with a sound recorder.

Hockey season is starting soon! There’s been a lot of excitement around that lately. First, the Vancouver Canucks unveiled their new jersey. It brings absolutely nothing new to the table, except for “VANCOUVER” in big block letters on the front. People don’t seem to like it, and there have been riot calls, but honestly I quite like it. I think it’s an improvement from before. True, I like the vintage more; it’s a timeless classic. But I think the new jersey does look nice, represents Vancouver, and even the block letters don’t bother me. Rather, they fill out the space, I think. Though, I do think “CANUCKS” would have looked better. NHL 08 is also coming out soon. 8 days. I’m planning to get it right on the day it comes out. Or actually, maybe I’ll wait a couple days and see if it’s next gen. Honestly, EA is not ripping me off again with their rehashed crap. Lastly, the hockey pool is starting again. There is still a whole month before the season starts, but several people are already tweaking and re-tweaking their roster to find that perfect fit. I found the whole thing last year to be high on addiction and low on reward, honestly. Kind of like smoking, I supposed? Not that I’ve tried.

I like that new Avril Lavigne song, “When You’re Gone”. Actually I think there are a few pretty good songs out lately, including “Don’t Stop the Music” and “Stronger”. Love the beats for while I’m doing some random coding.

I always needed time on my own
I never thought I’d need you there when I cry
And the days feel like years when I’m alone
And the bed where you lie
Is made up on your side

When you walk away
I count the steps that you take
Do you see how much I need you right now?

When you’re gone
The pieces of my heart are missing you
When you’re gone
The face I came to know is missing too
When you’re gone
The words I need to hear to always get me through the day
And make it OK
I miss you

I never felt this way before
Everything that I do
Reminds me of you
And the clothes you left
They lie on the floor
And they smell just like you
I love the things that you do

We were made for each other
Out here forever
I know we were
Yeah Yeah

All I ever wanted was for you to know
Everything I do I give my heart and soul
I can hardly breathe I need to feel you here with me
Yeah

Imagine there’s no Heaven
It’s easy if you try
No hell below us
Above us only sky
Imagine all the people
Living for today

Imagine there’s no countries
It isn’t hard to do
Nothing to kill or die for
And no religion too
Imagine all the people
Living life in peace

You may say that I’m a dreamer
But I’m not the only one
I hope someday you’ll join us
And the world will be as one

Imagine no possessions
I wonder if you can
No need for greed or hunger
A brotherhood of man
Imagine all the people
Sharing all the world

You may say that I’m a dreamer
But I’m not the only one
I hope someday you’ll join us
And the world will live as one

A man walking along a California beach finds a Genie in a lamp. The Genie says “I will grant you one wish.”

The man said, “Build a bridge to Hawaii, so I can drive over anytime I want to.”

The Genie replies, “Your request is very materialistic. Think of the logistics of that kind of undertaking. The supports required to reach the bottom of the Pacific! The concrete and steel it would take! It is hard for me to justify fulfilling such a wish. Take a little more time and think of another wish.”

The man thought about it for a long time. Finally he said, “Ok, my wife says that I am uncaring and insensitive. I wish that I could understand women. I want to know how they feel inside, what they are thinking when they give me the silent treatment, why they cry, what they mean when they say “nothing”, and how I can make a woman truly happy.”

After a few minutes the genie said, “You want two lanes or four on that bridge?”

Yesterday you asked me something I thought you knew
So I told you with a smile, it’s all about you
Then you whispered in my ear and you told me too
Said you’d make my life worthwhile, it’s all about you

And I would answer all your wishes
If you asked me to
But if you deny me one of your kisses
Don’t know what I’d do
So hold me close and say three words like you used to do
Dancing on the kitchen tiles, it’s all about you, yeah!

And I would answer all your wishes
If you ask me to
But if you deny me one of your kisses
Don’t know what I’d do
So hold me close and say three words like you used to do
Dancing on the kitchen tiles
Yes you make my life worthwhile
So I told you with a smile
It’s all about you

All About You – McFly

Post yours and let’s compare! Though we aren’t likely to have any common courses. By the way, it’s kinda early to be thinking about this, but if anyone’s planning on taking any cool electives in Fall 2008 then let me know! That’ll be my third year term two, when I finally get to take an elective. =D

Summer is in full swing and the weather’s beautiful. It’s nice and hot outside, but that’s not where I’m spending my time. Nope, I get to sit in front of a computer all day in a cold as hell air conditioned room and be a code monkey. Okay, so maybe it’s actually a blessing to have air conditioning in some ways, but I like warm/heat! And I like wearing shorts, rather than having to wear my jeans and maybe even long sleeves to work every day, and then suffer as I commute home on a steaming skytrain. Sometimes I bring shorts to work so I can change out when I go home, but most of the time I’m too lazy.

I’ve started taking some piano lessons (from Grace) and its been pretty cool! Haha, piano is so much more gratifying to learn than trombone. Just a month of learning and I’m already pretty much at the point of playing as fast on piano as I could on trombone. And this is after learning trombone for 6 years. And it’s pretty cool playing chords. Though I still maintain that it’s perfectly possible to play chords on trombone. It just sounds a little bit like a dying cat. Or a skytrain. Yeah, more like a skytrain.

My parents just had a BBQ at my house last night and I totally stuffed myself on meat. The pork chops and ribs and everything were so good! And my grandma always makes this peanut/celery/carrot salad that’s a lot better than it sounds. Mmmm. But the problem is that I think I ate too much meat, because I feel like crap today. Or maybe it’s just because they stayed so late and I had to get up for work at 6:40. But when my alarm rang I just reset to an hour later because I was still so tired. Better to push my day back than to fall asleep at work, I figure.

Work is pretty alright, I suppose. I keep hearing stories about co-ops that do nothing but design a web page all summer, or browse facebook, or just sit there, etc. But thankfully not the case for me, because I get to actually program something useful! Cubical life is weird, though. I think I prefer school. Sitting in the same place facing the same monitor all day doesn’t aid productivity too much. Somehow there’s gotta be some way to create some sense of urgency! In school I’d always try to make the most of any chance I got to use a computer and get as much work done as possible. (Okay, so I wasted a lot of it in the lab browsing Facebook) But still, it felt different. I felt more motivated, probably because my marks were hanging in the balance.

That got me to thinking about an article I read, about the productivity of cubical workers. Some believe that the average office dweller spends only about 1 or 2 hours in an 8 hour work day actually working hard. The other hours are wasted slacking, staring into space, being bored, etc. There’s gotta be some motivation! I have to wonder what would happen if project leaders graded employees on their work. Maybe then people would get to work. Or if that’s too negative… maybe if they dangle a carrot (so to speak), like cash bonuses in front of people for a job well done. Not that it seems to be needed where I work… which, from what I hear, isn’t the case universally.

It’s such a massive departure from school. It feels like there’s a lot less pressure, which really feels weird, but being off the hook for so long has me feeling a little worried about next school term. And I got a 4 month extension on my co-op term, too, which means I’ll be doing this until end of December. At this point, it really seems that come January, I’ll be thrown right into the deep end.

It doesn’t help that I’ve got a 22 credit term lined up for spring 2008. I still blame UBC for that, even though it’s a bit illogical. My course selection was a couple weeks ago, and before that I had a perfectly good, beautiful schedule planned out. Start at 8 on MWF, end at 12 or 1. Then only one class on Tuesday and Thursday. Just the way I like it. Well course selection morning, I went on, and found that I mysteriously had a conflict in my beautiful schedule!! Apparently they switched the time for a couple of my courses. Well, no worry, I just dropped one and moved another one and it went back to looking nice, so I let it be.  Fast forward to last week. I looked on the SSC again just to make sure that everything was okay. Well everything was definitely not okay!! They switched the times AGAIN!! And now they had switched it in a way that I was still going early every day, yet leaving late every day too! And they switched a required course that probably wasn’t available in another term, so I was stuck with a long day, and ugly holes all over my schedule. I had 19 credits at that point so I figured, okay, I might as well add another course to fill out the schedule. Net result: 22 credits. I have a theory on this whole thing. I think that the engineering people at UBC were looking at students schedules, and saw that some had actually put together a decent looking one. Well, they weren’t going to have any of that, obviously, so they went and ruined it. Just my theory, though. ^_~

Other than that, though, summer has been going great, just as summer should be. On Canada Day, I went to the Qi Gong festival. And of course, they had the obligatory chocolate fondue fountain at dinner. Afterwards I headed out to Jericho beach to watch Fireworks with Wes, Jess, & Co. lol, that has a nice ring to it. Slapjack in the dark was fun… kinda. Except I couldn’t see anything. I’m not sure if anyone else could, but I just slapped whenever everyone else did! Or whenever Jess screamed… XD Watching those fireworks makes me really wanna watch Celebration of Light, though! Gotta make it the third year in a row to go to all four!

Beach party is in two weeks! I’m starting to get pretty stoked about that. The weather outside is SO perfect for beach these days. It seems like there’s something good happening every weekend! Symphony in the Park is next week. Saturday events are always great (thanks Wes and Aaron and everyone else who always organizes it!!) and there’s hockey every week! Did I mention I love summer?

On Saturday Gavin, Suhrud, and I went to Sports Junkies to check out some hockey gear. I didn’t find any affordable goalie equipment I wanted, but I bought some decent stuff! Got a right handed baseball glove, inline wheels, and a blade. I realized afterwards that we don’t have a left handed blocker, which means I’ll have to wear two gloves and stand like a crab! The wheels were a decent deal, I got eight for $20. Four were 82a durometer and four were 78a durometer, though. The hard ones are a nasty flesh color and say “Nike Angrypin” on them. The soft ones are Rollerblade brand, and have lots of bubbles inside. Must be some form of cheap weight reduction, or more likely cost reduction. As for the blade, it’s on a whole other level of awesomeness. It’s huge for a junior blade (my shaft’s a junior), it looks like the cheapest blade money can buy, and it says “Glass Reinforced KILLER” on it. So all in all, I can’t wait until the weekend rolls around, so we can play more hockey. =D

So after that, we met up with Aimie and went to North Van (or North Shore City, as she calls it) and walked around… my last memory of that place was not a good one. My parents dragged me along to browse the shops, and I kept complaining and wanting to go home. There really isn’t much in North Vancouver to see (sorry, Gina and Will). So we went back to downtown, and walked around being indecisive about what to eat. We walked into Subway and stood around looking at the menu, and then decided to leave because no one actually wanted sandwiches. Hopefully they don’t recognize me next time I walk in there for lunch.

On Saturday I went for breakfast and IHOP with Chris. Pancakes were eeeexxxcellent. =D I hadn’t had those since… probably going to IHOP last time, during what was it, Winter? Probably before that! Western breakfasts taste so good sometimes! Mmm… I gotta learn how to make pancakes.

The weekend before that, Jon and I went to BCIT to do a photo shoot. The photos have been posted on Facebook! There were a few nice ones, but we should have used his camera. It was probably better. I’m still wanting a DSLR. I know it’s just one of those periodic urges that will probably nothing more than a passing fancy, but it could turn into an impulse buy if I’m not careful, especially with the Nikon D40 being at a decent price these days. Well, I think I’m going to the protege meet next week, which should make for some awesome photos.

Did I mention I love summer? =D

I walk in to Safeway and this elderly lady approaches me and tells me I look just like her grandson. I was like that is nice. She goes on to say that he died recently and would I mind calling her grandma, so I said okay have a good day “grandma”.

I went on my way and was ready to check out. I was like 4 people behind this elderly lady and she yells, BYE GRANDSON! I didn’t want to embarrass her so I yelled back BYE GRANDMA! So I got up in the line. Keep in mind I am in the Express aisle with like 3 things. The lady proceeds to tell me it’s $85. I was like what???

She said “your GRANDMA” said you were paying for her stuff. I was like she is not even my grandma and the lady says “well you just said bye grandma”.

I didn’t have any cash so I asked the lady to hold my visa and said I would be right back. I ran outside and see this older lady sprinting away. I was running after her. She starts the car and is ready to pull away. Her leg was still hanging out of the car so I dove and PULLED her leg like I am pulling yours right now.

The term’s ended! With nine days worth of break, I got starting making good use of it immediately by installing my new stereo! Bought it used on craigslist, which took quite a bit of searching! But in the end I actually found what I want. =D The wiring harness is made by Scosche and didn’t include an illumination signal wire. I didn’t want to have to modify the stock harness since that would make it difficult to put the old deck back, so I put a new wire in myself by using an old wire from the lab. That meant that I had to cut up one of my beloved banana plugs, though. I taped it onto the harness with some electrical tape so that it would stay in place. Other than that, the wiring was pretty straight forward. I used some butt splices to connect the wires. It was a pain because I don’t have a crimping tool, so I had to use a pair of pliers and a good amount of hand strength.

Scosche wiring harness

The ground wire from the new deck needed to be connected directly to the car’s frame. If connected to the stock harness ground, it introduces alternator whine into the system. A small AC signal on top of a supposedly stable DC reference. Wow, I can’t believe that EECE 254 stuff is actually relevant to real world stuff. Anyway, I spliced one of my alligator clips into that line and clipped it on the frame. I wanted something that would be easy to remove later.

Alligator ground clip

Don’t worry – I bundled up my wires and made sure all the colors matched before stuffing them in there, like any self-respecting EE would do. =)

Bundled up wires ready to be put in!

I ran into the same problem most people do when trying to install an aftermarket unit. Mazda put a big rubber support on the back of the stock radio to hold it in place and stop vibrations. Nice innovation… NOT! It doesn’t fit on anything else! And they didn’t put any holes on the firewall support to attach other radios. But I figured, theirs is probably the best way to do it so I’ll make my own! I took a banana plug, an M4×30mm screw, and two M4 nuts, and wrapped lots of electrical tape neatly around it, making a nice bolt that screws right into the back of the new deck!

“Custom” rear deck support stub

The original radio was double DIN, which meant I needed to find a way to cover up the gaping hole that my single DIN unit left. Mazda’s radio pocket off of a Mazdaspeed Protege cost $120. I said no thanks, $120 is ridiculous for a piece of plastic with a little door on it. So I found the part number and ordered the doorless radio pocket from an MX-6, which costs $12. Wow. It fit right in and snapped tightly, no problems at all. Now I have more storage space too! Nice place for cell phone.

Closed, plain face

The deck, though, was a bit more of a pain to actually put in. The mounting cage it came with didn’t really fit in the opening so I had to bend it to fit. And then it was too loose and didn’t hold anything up at all. The issue is that the opening is designed for a double-DIN unit, so there’s no support in the middle. An MSP radio support costs $20, so I wanted to try to avoid it. The answer? Cardboard! I stuck a folded piece of cardboard between the pocket and the deck, and it holds everything snug! Pretty ghetto in there, but it works!

Yep… looks pretty stock…

Installed, I think it looks pretty good! I wanted to go for the stock look as much as possible, and I think the folding mechanism is a good compromise. Looks like a blank panel when off.

Finished product, with face open!

Final result! It’s a pretty nice radio. I got it mainly for the MP3 playback. It was pretty annoying having to play regular CDs on the old deck, which meant that usually in a single trip I’d be done the disc. And plus the old deck didn’t read CD-R’s very well. I like having radio text too. I always find myself wishing I knew the name of the song playing, but now I won’t be! =D Good security features, too. The face is detachable, and the whole unit is useless without it. And there’s a security code, too.

An easy install, overall. Getting the dang thing into the dash was the hardest part. Wiring was a little time-consuming since Mazda’s colors don’t match conventional ones. And I didn’t have my wire strippers. Some wires ended up a lot shorter than I wanted because scissors cut pretty well! Somehow I lost the strippers in the lab, without knowing! Think I lent them out but forgot to who… I guess it was a reward to myself for finishing the term. Though I probably don’t deserve it. That’s for another post, though. For now, GO CANUCKS GO!

Aaah what a rollercoaster of emotions these last two days. First I get all worried about the 259 final, and then when I took it I actually understood the stuff, amazingly! So I came out of that pretty happy and everything, and ended up not studying that much for 261 the next day. Well that turned out to be a stupid thing to do because 261 was the hardest @#%@ test I have ever taken! There was not a single question that I really knew how to do! I mean okay, there were parts of questions that I knew, but no whole questions where I can say that I think I got the answer. Failing would be very bad right now, especially considering my 50% grade on the midterm.

Wow, 2nd year is BAD. I seriously think I’m gonna kill my GPA after this term ends, and I’m gonna miss my goal… argh… and it’s not like I havn’t studied. I’ve done every problem set for 261 and everything! But it still makes no sense… -_-’ I dunno… weird since I did pretty well in 153. And I’ve got a real bad feeling about 267. It’s gonna be the same horror all over again this Friday. What do I do!! Take apart my computer so I can’t go on facebook?!!

Haha I blame this on the Canucks. If they never made the playoffs then I’d have way more time to study! I might have to skip a Canucks game just to study… maybe I should go to UBC so I won’t be so distracted. But aarrgh there’s computers at UBC too! Computers everywhere! OMG! Checkmate!!

It’s been another long, long while since I last posted a meager post. For good reason too, lots has been happening in my life and I just don’t have the time to stop and think about it! Well actually, I do have the time to stop and think about it, but since I took the time to do thinking, I ran out of time for writing.

Finals are in about two days. It’s interesting how I’m not panicking at all. I think my sense of panic just kind of wore out. It used to be there, back in first year. But then I discovered that by some kind of fluky chance, I can get decent marks without being in a big rush to study. Which pretty much took away all the motivation I ever had to study. So here I am on Friday evening with an exam Monday and an exam Tuesday, and what am I doing? Blogging. And just finished watching the Canucks game. And browsing facebook too.

Weird how facebook kinda just took the community by storm, and how you’re probably reading this post off facebook, even though it originates from my blog that you probably didn’t know existed. Facebook is kinda revolutionary, I think. Not in that it’s a new idea because that kind of thing honestly has been done before, to lesser success. It’s revolutionary because it’s a kind of de-anonymizing of the internet. People used to try to avoid putting their names/address/email/contacts on the internet. But now it’s like they’ve come out of the closet and they’re showing the whole world! It’s not like there’s any less risk now. It must be a stalker’s dream, to have everyone organized in a database by school, interests, clubs, fetishes, whatever. And who was it that said it should be an advertisement agency’s dream? (was it you, Vincent?) You’re absolutely right.

Two weeks ago, I started a little project. The weak front motor mount in the 3rd generation 2.0L Protege is known to break. I had been getting jerky driving in first and second gear ever since I got the car, and up until recently, I thought I was just bad at driving manual. But it turns out that No.3 mount was to blame (or I’d like to think so anyway ^_~). I took it out and indeed the soft rubber was already ripped halfway through. Being a DIY’er, I went and got two syringes of fast-curing industrial strength epoxy, and filled the mount with it to reinforce it.

It kinda worked, but wasn’t ideal. Swaying was much reduced. Vibration was much increased! Sitting at stop signs, the entire car would start vibrating and it would feel like sitting in a massage chair! lol it was kinda hilarious. I think that the engine or mount has a resonant frequency at around 750 rpm that Mazda didn’t do a great job of tuning out. After a couple of days, I noticed the vibrations start to decrease. Turns out the epoxy cracked and started to separate from the core.

So I put in an order for a new motor mount for $50 + $13 shipping from SLS Performance in Salt Lake City, Utah. I wanted they to ship by USPS, but they shipped it with UPS anyway saying that the item was too big. Okay, fair enough. After a week or so, I came home to find a UPS note on my door. It said that they wanted $43 for a “Brokerage” fee. They said $3 was duties, $7 was taxes, and $33 was basically to pay someone to fill out a form. Well I got all worked up and pissed about it, and found out that lots of people have experienced this and the general consensus is to just avoid UPS altogether when shipping to Canada.

I seriously question the legality of this. First of all, I wasn’t notified of this at any point, until the package came to my house. I already paid for the product and I already paid UPS to ship it to me. So basically they pretend everything is good and dandy until the driver comes to my door, with my package being held hostage in one hand, and trying to grab my money with the other. Secondly, according to section 32 of the Customs Act (I did my homework), a legitimate broker must have written, signed permission from me, granting them power of attorney, before importing items on my behalf. They didn’t even attempt to contact me, let alone get my written permission.

Well I was having none of that. I assembled all my paperwork and legal documents and crap and got ready to fight out a battle. I called them on their BS and stated (not asked, stated) that I would be clearing customs myself. And to my surprise, they said okay! Finding a bit of time today, I made my way down to the new UPS hub at the airport. After waiting in line for about half an hour for the two very slow working employees to serve a line of three people, they said that they would start the paperwork and be done in twenty minutes. So after having waited more than an hour in total there, I finally got the paperwork and drove over to the government customs office. After waiting in line for about two minutes, I showed the officer my paperwork. He stamped it, and sent me off on my merry way! No taxes, no duties, no nothing. So basically UPS was giving me 100% BS and trying to blame the charges on the government when in reality they’re taking it because they think they can get away with it. Well going back to the UPS office, I waited in line for another fifteen minutes to pick up my package.

I traded two hours to save $43. Not too bad, if you ask me. No wonder UPS is being sued right now. After seeing the invoice and shipping papers, there was a document in there that said I grant them power of attorney. The signature sign was empty though, so I don’t see how they can get away with it. So after the ordeal, I would definitely avoid UPS in the future if at all possible! USPS/Canadapost can import/export just fine without charging ridiculous fees.

So anyway, after I got home with the mount it was still early afternoon so I got under my car, took out the old, now epoxy-filled mount, and put the new one in! I love how it looks! Very stock and inconspicuous, which is how it was meant to be! There are still some vibrations, sadly. But on the plus side, the changes to the car’s driving dynamics are incredible! I never expected the car to feel a whole lot different while driving, but the throttle response is now instant! Its now become obvious to me that the old broken mount was taking away a lot of the power of the engine as it wasted the precious little juice it had to twist the engine around on its soft, crappy mounts. Now that power goes straight to the wheels and the drivetrain components are protected from the stress of engine movement too! Bonus! So that’s that.

I think that from this, I’ve realized that I’m too quick to assume hostility when there’s a conflict. When I called UPS’s customer service, I assumed that they would try to blow me off, but I was definitely surprised to find that they simply met my demands. I think I do that a lot. But I think it’s also because I’ve been burned before, caught with my pants down, so to speak. I’ve realized that now, whenever I’m making a call, asking for something, demanding something, questioning something, I’ve always got all the relevant paperwork laid out in front of me, a calculator to my left, and Google on my computer screen.

And I do that on a personal level too. Well, not the whole paperwork thing (that would be scary) but if there’s a conflict, I too easily turn hostile and assume the other person will be hostile too. Maybe as a customer it can sometimes help me get what I want, but on a personal level, it doesn’t help resolve anything.

Changing gears… so what else has happened lately… the Canucks, of course! Playoff games are going on in Vancouver again, after three years without! And what a way to begin. First game, the Canucks get a two goal lead in the third period and then blow it. They go four overtimes and almost into a fifth before Henrik Sedin finally ends it with a merciful goal. It was an incredible game, for sure. I was originally planning on doing my project, but ended up watching until about 12:30, when the game ended. What a team to go into the playoffs with, too! Backed by the greatest goalie in the league, I have to like their chances this year. I hope it won’t affect my marks, though! Playoffs for students have begun too, in the form of finals. -_-’

I’m really looking towards summer term, though. I finally got a job! I’m gonna be working as a programmer, so should be very exciting! In some ways, the more time I spend at school, the more I realize I’m meant to be an engineer. We’ve had a couple projects this term and it’s really been a blast working on them! Though they are such a pain, it’s really fun! I love finally using the things we learn in lecture and finding out what the real world is like, rather than just analysing stuff in a textbook. Maybe I should have gone to PIP… naaah. =P

I’m kinda realizing that I’m more interested in CE than EE and Biomed, though. I’m not sure what I should do! I think EE/Biomed have more career potential, but maybe I should pursue my interests? It’s a hard decision, though, because EE is still similar in a lot of ways, and staying with it will not be totally leaving my favorites behind. Maybe I should find out when’s the deadline for switching departments (or whether it has passed) and go from there… but there’s another reason I don’t wanna leave Biomed…

I went out to wreck beach again the other day. To do some thinking. Its been a long time since I’ve gone somewhere myself just for the sake of being there. No other reason. The peace and quiet is nice. I felt so alone out there, though. There was this strange feeling of solitude as I looked out over the waters of the Georgia straight. I found myself wishing. As I looked at the occasional car coming down the road and then making a u-turn as it reached the dead end, I wondered if I could break away from what I’ve always done in the past. Maybe I should just do it. Maybe I should stop making excuses for myself.

My Pokemon brings all the girls to the yard
And they’re like, wanna trade cards?
Damn right, I wanna trade cards
I can beat you, I’ve got a charizard

Craziest week ever.

Positives:

• 9/10 on project
• Got an interview

Negatives:

• School starts again
• Midterm
• Project due
• Staying up till 3am to work on project, only to wake up for school 3 hours later
• Got numerous terrible marks on marked exams
• Interview is this week, at 7:30 in the morning
• Dead tired
• Scraped front bumper
• Late for project demo
• More to come

Also… for you people who regularly get like 4 hours of sleep, how do you do it? Just one 3 hour night, and my head hurts, I’ve got a strange taste in my mouth, stomach problems, eyes red, slow reaction times, reduced judgement ability. Strangely, though, I feel extremely energetic and awake! Ughghhghg…

I’ve been doing lots and lots with my break time so far and I’m very satisfied with it. I’m having a combination of work and play, and it’s working out really well! Above all I’m doing some of the things I love doing and it just feels so good. I went running a couple days ago and realized how bad a shape I’m in now. And now I’m trying to do that new kind of running where you go all out for half a minute, then walk for half a minute, then go all out again, etc. Supposedly it helps with endurance in stuff that has a lot of that kind of bursts of strength or something? Haha I don’t know, makes sense, right?

I’ve just noticed how bad my health really is these days. After a lot of rigorous exercise I get kinda lightheaded and can’t seem to take in enough oxygen to supply my brain/body properly. I think I just need to exercise much more often. Once every blue moon is not enough. And rollerblading is not enough because I never get really badly tired from rollerblading because I always have to turn before I can spend enough energy to get my speed up! LOL. I think my crossover technique isn’t good enough yet. Only running hard gets me to that point.

So today I went with Katherine and some to Boston Pizza and had dinner and they had the Canucks game! The Canucks this year are so awesome. Haha, Dave Nonis is seriously my new hero. And Dany Sabourin with his first NHL win! Sweet! (Oooooh Dany Booooy!) Anyway I ordered a Smokey Mountain Spaghetti with Meatballs in Alfredo Sauce. Bad choice. Spaghetti just was not meant for white sauce, I think. It was just way too creamy and not sour enough. But I guess it’s okay because it prevented me from eating too much. The thing was HUGE and I only ate about half of it.

Afterwards we went arcade and played Mariokart! LOL it’s seriously the weirdest thing ever. I feel like I’m playing MT, except I see Yoshi and Mario in front of me. And I try my MT techniques, which don’t work at all. Also tried Battle Gear 4 and it’s pretty fun! It’s really slow but what I like is the 6 speed manual with clutch pedal and handbrake! It feels quite real too since you can’t physically put it in gear without pressing the clutch! But I think my feelings towards arcade have changed. Without the beloved UBC arcade, it’s just not the same. And the type of people that hang out at arcades sometimes… =/

Applying to co-op has been a difficult exerience. I’ve applied to like twelve jobs, which admittedly is not a lot compared to some people, and gotten zero interviews. Before that first interview, it’s just so hard! It’s hard to keep writing these cover letters because it makes me wonder, is there something wrong with my cover letters?!?! Is there something wrong with my resume? Is there something wrong with ME?! But oh well, I guess I’ll keep trying and hopefully land a job that fits me. After hearing peoples experiences about EA I was kinda hesitant about my desire to work there, but actually I still want to! It may not be the most relevant engineering experience or most valuable experience to any field, but if there’s any job I might actually enjoy, it’ll probably be that one.

Yesterday I changed my oil/filter and also got some nice new windshield wipers on there to replace my old cheap Canadian Tire ones! The difference is night and day! Now it’s sooo clear and silent! This is why my philosophy is that you should just get the good stuff to start with, every time… except sometimes that cheapy side of me comes out. Or maybe more than sometimes. =P Anyway it was a nice afternoon spent under the car, checking and making sure that all the stuff is fine, shifter bushings setting in properly, etc.

Then afterward I played hockey with my brother and accidently hit him in the eye with the ball! >< Feel so bad about it… poor kid.. but don’t worry, it’s one of those light foam balls that’s like as light as a ping pong ball! And afterward he started wearing a helmet… lol. There’s something else I’ve found time to do during break.

I’ve found that I’m getting a bit more relaxed. I’m settling into the term a bit better now that we’re two months in, and finally getting a good grasp of things. It feels good! I don’t think I’ve had this feeling since first year. I’m on a roll and things are going my way, just by doing whatever feels right. Which is important because I go a lot on intuition, I think. I don’t know why people think I’m observant and always thinking; I’m not. I’m completely the opposite. I do things just based on hunches and feelings and thankfully they’re more than often right.

Tomorrow I’m going to UBC with Phil and Andrew to work on our project! Haha, it kinda sucks to have to work over the break, and I foresee a lot of work coming in our near future, but I must admit that it’s quite exciting! I can see why the PIP people might love their stuff so much despite living in the lab! Learning the theory is kinda boring, but when you really have to design your own stuff and test things out for yourself, it’s so satisfying! And it’s even more satisfying when it works!! That’s the best part. The moment when a square wave the frequency of my pulse came out on the oscilloscope, I almost cried. Okay, fine, I didn’t, but you get the idea. Pretty sweet.

So I’m getting a new phone soon. I know I’ve been saying that for a long time, but it should finally be happening soon! I managed to negotiate a pretty nice deal with Bell, and now it’s time to see if Rogers will match. Haha, I used to be all about minimalism, but I think I’ve seen the light. Well, minimalism is still cool, but only when it’s done elegantly! Anyway I hope I can get a cool phone that can really be used as a camera. Right now I’m in the dilemma of needing a camera to carry around with me more often, but mine is too old, too big, and too broken. And I’m torn between getting a small-portable camera and a big advanced one. I’m leaning towards the SLR side, but maybe a bit farther in the future.

Today we watched “Just My Luck”. It was a chick flick, but not bad, really. Haha, it made me realize that I kinda believe in luck, though. Probability only goes so far. Sometimes you need luck or you’re screwed. Because sometimes it’s pretty probable to be screwed. Which reminds me of Virgin Mobile’s motto: “You won’t be a virgin once we’re done screwing you.”

Aaah I wonder when my current streak of luck will end. Things are just going so perfectly, in a lot of ways. Should I be sad when it’s over? I kinda take it for granted, but what else can I do? Nothing, I’d think. I realized that I needed to break free, that’s all. Break free from it all and ffflllyyyy! LOL yeah, that’s really vague and artsy, I know.

Step one you say we need to talk
He walks you say sit down it’s just a talk
He smiles politely back at you
You stare politely right on through
Some sort of window to your right
As he goes left and you stay right
Between the lines of fear and blame
And you begin to wonder why you came

Where did I go wrong, I lost a friend
Somewhere along in the bitterness
And I would have stayed up with you all night
Had I known how to save a life

Let him know that you know best
Cause after all you do know best
Try to slip past his defense
Without granting innocence
Lay down a list of what is wrong
The things you’ve told him all along
And pray to God he hears you
And pray to God he hears you

Where did I go wrong, I lost a friend
Somewhere along in the bitterness
And I would have stayed up with you all night
Had I known how to save a life

As he begins to raise his voice
You lower yours and grant him one last choice
Drive until you lose the road
Or break with the ones you’ve followed
He will do one of two things
He will admit to everything
Or he’ll say he’s just not the same
And you’ll begin to wonder why you came

Just in case you’re wondering, no, my blogging hasn’t degraded so far in quality that I’m now resorting to posting only song lyrics. Afterall, if this were a forum, that would be violating point 3 of the guidelines to good posts: “Threads which contain only song lyrics have exactly no value.”

But there are some really powerful songs out there… I think I’m repeating myself by saying that.

Anyway life’s been busy, school’s been busy, and friends have been busy. When did our lives turn so crazy?! And I think that when people say “it only gets worse”, they’re not overstating it one bit. So let’s do this right, shall we? =)

You know that feeling that adrenaline gives you? That burst of superhuman speed/reaction time/lack of judgement? I get that a lot. But then afterwards I feel out of breath, I’m shaking, and I can’t hold my hand still.

The second term of the 2006/2007 winter academic year has officially begun. And what a start it has been! But first, the prologue.

The ski trip was awesome! For the weekend we (Danny, Anthony, Aimie, Kezia, Jeff, Jamie, and I) went to Silverstar. We did so much skiing (and boarding)! Skied the first night there in freezing temperature and wind, where I couldn’t find my toque. The second day was absolutely beautiful, though! Sunny clear sky, and some great snow! We went on all sorts of runs from green to black. Conclusion… greens are the hardest. Highlights of the trip… jumps on the Milky Way; creepy Susie girl; christmas tree; watching movies till 2; instant noodles; whoring of said instant noodles; OWNING the right side in the scavenger hunt.

Hmm, I’m looking to switch cell phones/plans/companies but not sure what I should get. With the new mandate for number portability coming March 14th, I think I’ll wait till then. Maybe I can get my home number ported to my phone, and maybe there will be a price war in an effort to get people to switch.

This term is a mystery to me at the moment. All my courses are called EECE. The only exception is MATH, which is instantly hard. But apparently my prof, Joel Feldman, is one of the best at UBC so that should help. I’m hoping desperately that I’ll have more free time. I don’t know if that’s possibly with seven courses, plus choir, plus dance, plus Qigong, plus co-op job applications. On average we have to apply for like fourty jobs before getting one for co-op! So that’s basically like an hour spent on co-op every single day.

I’m finding more and more that I’m really part of the UBC community now, though. Now it seems that everywhere I go, and every class I’m in, I know people, whether they’re friends or just aquaintances. I see friends walking around outside or in hallways or in the sub all the time. And more than that, I’m meeting lots of people! Connections! Networking! Today I met a cool guy from Campus Crusade through Aimie.

I’m also finding that some of my profs are actually real people. You know, like with real personalities, lives, and interests and all! But only some of them.

Hmm, my life is changing and I’m not sure how to interpret and adapt to that change.

Happy Holidays and Happy New Year, everyone! A bit late with the greetings, I’m afraid, but I’ve been so busy that there’s been no time to blog! I’m making the most of my time this holiday season, using up every last minute spending time with the people (and things) I love.

I remember breaks in high school. Halfway through the first day in, I would already be bored and depressed from having nothing to do. But having seven courses and zero free time during the school term really makes my time more valuable, during all seasons. I’ve been catching up with people, catching up on things, and catching up on things like Canucks and Final Fantasy, of course.

I think I prefer it this way. Sure, having lots of free time like I used to was good, but I didn’t value it anyway. Now I’m really going out almost every day during this twenty-one day break (yes, I counted), and on the days I don’t go out or have something at my house, I’m spending some quality time with my family and my brother.

Maybe this is how life is meant to be lived? I’m sure you’d agree. ^_~

School is starting soon, though, and I’m not one to completely avoid thinking about it, so today I went down to UBC to pay my tuition, get my scholarship stuff done, and get my books (saved $50 by buying used). Now I’m all prepped for the term. All that’s left is to get seven new binders and I’m set. At this rate, I wonder where I’m going to fit all the binders by fifth year… Oh yes, I’ve almost sold all my first year textbooks! Very happy about that! Guess I did price them ridiculously low, but hey, better than keeping those things! Of course, I didn’t sell my favorite one, Stewart Calculus. =)

I’ve been spending quite a bit lately, what with the going out all the time and Christmas and then post-Boxing Day shopping. But I realized that in the grand scheme of things, those expenses are pretty minor and it’s better to just go enjoy myself while I have the time. During school I barely go out at all, though Thursday is looking good this term… *hint hint*

Hey if anyone has lunch break at 11 or 12 this term, call me and we’ll hook up!

Speaking of school, too, most of my marks came out pretty fast! But there’s one that’s still not, and it’s really killing me. Yup, I’m a marks whore. It really kills me to not know what I got. Jay, you’re not the only one furiously pressing F5! =P

On Friday I’m leaving for skiing at Silverstar! It’s been a sparse ski season for me so far, so I’m pumped! Now I can’t decide whether I should bring both my skis and snowblades, or just my skis. The snowblades disappointed last time, but that was in fairly loose snow. Perhaps they will fare better in groomed snow? I realized that I enjoy skiing groomed and ice more than I do powder. But regardless, I’m gonna enjoy this.

I’ve added this blog to facebook… wonder how it works! I never even knew “notes” existed until I looked for an RSS feed today. Do my old blog notes get deleted when they scroll off the page?

So anyway, I’m looking forward to next term with lots of optimism. I speak of my life in terms of school terms, even the things that aren’t school-associated. It’s because at this point, school dominates my life. But there are other things too, of course! ^_~ Last term was looking kinda bleak and depressing. But with the help of friends I managed to pull through unscathed (bucketloads of thanks) and I think we made out even better than we expected!!

I think I’ve learned that I just need to put forth everything I’ve got, and if it was meant to happen, then it would. =)

I’m finding balance. Thank you.

Sometimes I’m crazy over something and get so excited about it. And I get obsessed with it and it’s like I have to have it, and it just cannot wait. Then it comes and goes and it’s not all that great and I realized there wasn’t that much reason to be all crazy about it.

On a completely unrelated matter, school’s over for two weeks. Some marks are out, and so far, the results are: =| =| =D =) =(

I went skiing today. It was raining and raining the entire time. I got drenched, cold, hungry, my toque fell off when the powder pulled me through an accidental 180 and a roll, and I LOVED IT!

Top 10 reasons to date an engineer:

1. The world does revolve around us… we choose the coordinate system.
2. No “couple” enjoy a better “moment”.
3. We know how to handle stress and strain in a relationship.
4. We have significant figures.
5. We understand the motion of rigid bodies.
6. Projectile motion: Do we need to say more?
7. Engineers do it to specification.
8. According to Newton, if two bodies interact, their forces are equal and opposite.
9. We know it’s not the length of the vector that counts, but how you apply the force.
10. WE KNOW THE RIGHT HAND RULE!

=D That’s right, engineers are the bestest, sexiest people there are!

Wow… I just got burned… badly…

Should have known better than to do this during exam season… already spent so much effort on it… such a distraction. -_-’

I am:

• Arrogant
• Stubborn
• Always right
• Stubborn
• Stubborn
• Over-confident
• Prone to jealousy
• Always sure of myself, even if I’m wrong

To that end, finals havn’t been too bad and I’m sure that the next one will be an absolute disaster because I’ll have under-studied from over-confidence.

The ideal winter at UBC:

Outside the sub, students slip, stumble, and slide off to class.

Kaiser, the EE building, with the Engineering Cairn out front.

Oooo, a bicycle!

The chemistry building… aka Shelley’s house. =P It’s been under construction forever!

The reality of winter at UBC:

Water, water, everywhere…

Yeah, that’s what the oft-photographed UBC library looks like now.

Snow’s not very good for class attendance rates.

MATH 263 final tomorrow at noon. I have no confidence about this whatsoever. I did two practice finals and failed both. Running out of time, and I think I should get a full eight hours of sleep rather than study.

School’s over! Yet I’m still sitting here in the Library at 5:00 PM. Just finished the last CPSC lab, which was one of the least useful labs ever, and that’s saying a lot because most of them are pretty useless.

This morning our CPSC class finally had course evaluations. Interesting that the prof took the forms back himself… wonder what’s going on there. So what is my evaluation on 260? Well, I tried to not rag on the professor unfairly like some people did. Of course, that doesn’t mean I gave good ratings, but I didn’t just blindly give all 1’s. I gave my honest opinion in as objective a way as possible.

The course itself was terrible. Pitiful. I learned so little from this course that I think it would not be too much of a stretch to say that it actually detracted from my overall programming abilities. From day one, the course was organized very badly. No one ever had any idea what was going on, less than half the class actually went to the lectures by the end, and by the end of today’s lecture we had covered maybe two thirds of the curriculum. That’s not all the prof’s fault, though, because the amount of material in the course is just blows my mind. It’s a 4 credit course with 3 hours of lecture per week. In my opinion for this amount of material to learn, it should be a 6 credit course with 5 or 6 hours of lecture per week. Of course, that’s what it used to be. It used to be two different 3 credit courses.

The reason they do this is because of the engineering timetable, I suppose. If they were to make these changes and well as change Math 263 back to Math 200 + Math 317, then we’d have 9 courses and 44 credits this term, which doesn’t work out too well. (not that this does)

But whatever. That’s over, and good riddance. The only thing that’s going to get me through the final is my programming knowledge from previous courses.

I’ve got a choir rehearsal in two hours! That should be fun! Singing for 3 hours straight. I sure hope I don’t wear my voice out before tomorrow’s concert! We rehearsed for the first time in the Chan Centre last night, though, and it was so cool! Had the Choral Union, U Singers, Orchestra, and brass bands all there, and put together, it’s really something to behold. If you’ve got some time tomorrow night, especially if you’re on campus, you should really come out and watch! 8:00 PM, Chan Centre, tickets in advance from Ticketmaster or the box office in the Chan. (not sold at the door)

I’ve been having food at school a lot lately. I feel guilty about using so much money sometimes but then when I think about it, it turns into just another expense to absorb. Sure beats packing a sandwich in the morning and eating it 10 hours later when it’s all soggy.

My evaluation of the places I’ve tried in the sub:

• A&W: Nice source of hot food… but when you compare it to Subway, it doesn’t seem quite as good or nearly as healthy, though I have doubts that getting a sandwich with layers and layers of meat is very healthy anyway.
• Pasta place: Pretty good! Nice, hot and fresh with a lot of possible varieties, and only $5!
• Manchu Wok: The WORST place! There’s a reason why no one goes there.
• Honour Roll (Sushi): Mediocre at best. The rice they use is not up to snuff compared to most Japanese restaurants, and their prices are ridiculous. Spending $6 there will most likely not fill you up.
• Burger place: Good burgers. What more can I say…
• Tim Horton’s: If you’re eating donuts and coffee for meals… that’s not a good thing. But then again, that’s what I did during the summer. =P
• Subway: Probably the best value. Good sandwiches, not too expensive for a good amount.

I have pictures from UBC! I’ll post them when I get back home.

Sooo… what am I to do…

Doing what I like yields bad results.
Doing what I want doesn’t work.
Doing what you say is right kills me.
Doing what I think is right is a trap I’m afraid to get into.
Doing nothing just plain sucks.

It’s snowing again… I’m praying for school to be on tomorrow because if it’s not, our concert is cancelled. And then no EECE 251 classes anymore, and no lunch with Jen. The snow looked pretty bad when I was getting out of choir so I decided to take the bus home. Took an hour and a half plus, but by the sounds of it that’s way better than anyone else could do today. Now my baby is sitting in West Parkade. Hope she’s alright.

Went to see “A Moment With You” by WongFu last night, and it didn’t disappoint! I really liked it! Obviously it’s not gonna be as polished as a professional movie, but for what it is, it’s amazing! Loved every moment!

I cherish every moment… wonder if you do the same?

Due to global warming, we are going to have one of the coldest winters ever. Last time it’s been this cold at this time of the year was twenty years ago.

What I see from mybalcony in the morning… looks like Christmas! Too bad exams are still on. Classes were cancelled today so we had a snow day! But it leaves me a bit screwed because now I don’t know what my group is going to do for presentations.

My car braving the meager beginnings of snowfall. It would get totally stuck in there later and tonight I had to thaw it out and put it in the garage so I’d be able to drive on tuesday.

Nightfall… this is around 11:30 pm. It’s always really interesting how it’s really bright outside when there’s snow. I guess it reflects all the city lights, along with the clouds. I love the hush that falls over the city when there’s snow. Less cars to make noise, and the snow acts as some pretty good sound insulation.

It’s SNOOOOOOOOOWWWWWIIIIIIIIINNNNNNGGGGG!!!!!!

Angels we have on heard high
Sweetly singing ore the plains
And the mountains in reply
Echoing their joyous strains

That’s just so fascinating. It suddenly feels a lot like Christmas! Today was the Santa Claus parade in the morning. I didn’t go, but I was like a block away, playing hockey at 8:30 in the morning! The paved rink was more like an ice rink this morning because there was so much ice! It was freezing! Ironically, having all that ice totally smoothed out the rink, because normally there are all these uneven spots.

Last Christmas, I gave you my heart
But the very next day, You gave it away
This year, to save me from tears
I’ll give it to someone special

I came home, laid my head down on my desk, and slept for half an hour. And then after I woke up I felt tired still so I lied on my bed and slept another hour and a half. Woo that felt good. It feels soooo good to sleep sometimes! It’s ridiculous how good it feels…

Our cheeks are nice and rosy and comfy-cozy are we
We’re snuggled up together like two birds of a feather would be
Let’s take that road before us and sing a chorus or two
Come on, it’s lovely weather for a sleigh ride together with you

Then I went to the mall, and it started snowing. It was crazy! It felt really unreal because I’ve really lost track of time this year. Things have been so busy that it really doesn’t feel very long ago that I was in the sun on the beach relaxing, on the mountain stargazing, and working early shifts at Esso.

I don’t want a lot for Christmas
There’s just one thing I need
I don’t care about the presents
Underneath the Christmas tree
I don’t need to hang my stocking
There upon the fireplace
Santa Claus won’t make me happy
With a toy on Christmas day
I just want you for my own
More than you could ever know
Make my wish come true
All I want for Christmas is you

Driving is a pretty interesting experience with this new snow. My tires say all-season, but in reality they’re closer to no-season, especially not winter. The ABS comes on when I brake lightly going 20 km. And I can’t launch for the life of me without spinning the wheels!

O star of wonder, star of light,
Star with royal beauty bright,
Westward leading, still proceeding,
Guide us to thy perfect light.

It’s gonna be an interesting week! First final is just a bit more than a week away! And it’s the end of the term this week!! So excited… it really does feel like christmas.

One last thing… Christmas Concert! UBC Choral Union, University Singers, and Symphony Orchestra! Come! It’ll be worth it! Tickets $12 for students in advance at the Chan Centre box office, or from ticketmaster (not available at the door, because it sells out, I think). Saturday December 2nd, at 8:00 PM! =) See YOU there!

No way that could be a coincidence…

About the PS3, though, did you hear about all the incidents with the camping lines? People getting shot and/or robbed while in line. With all this, I’m going to bet that next time there’s a console launch, camping is going to be banned. This happened with the XBox a while ago too, I believe. Interesting that the Wii has had a perfectly smooth launch with most of the people getting their system rather than waiting out for nothing.

Friend’s MSN name: there’s someone out there who will understand you, and one day you two will meet… until then… keep doing your best. Easier said than done! =P No one understands me. Then again, I don’t blame them.

Thinking life
and living life
are two very different things,
The first one being harder
than the last

Ordered some pizza today… I got ham, pineapple, and pork meatballs! It’s actually not a bad combination at all! Tasted quite good. I can tell I’m on the verge of getting canker sores, though. There’s a price to pay… “Nothing is free in life” – L.Linares.

Now that I think of it, it’s pretty relieving most of the time when someone is up front and honest with you. (you meaning me) It’s much much better than knowing it but not having it out there in the open.

The end of midterms! I officially had my last midterm, computer science, on Thursday, and man it feels good! Not only that, but I think I did okay on it too! (well, okay being a very loosely used term) I celebrated the occasion by promptly skipping that class the next morning. Haha, it was an accident, though. I was up working on some homework till like 3:00, which, I dare to say, is the latest I’ve gone for homework-doing purposes. I really don’t like how I’m setting all these negative sleep records this year.

What I also did to celebrate was play Final Fantasy XII late into the night on Friday. My oh my, it’s such a great game. It might be reasonable to think it foolish to play games right before finals, but I think it actually helps matters. Gotta get some enjoyment sometimes, right? When I try to just work work work without balancing things, the work ends up going quite slowly and I still don’t get to play. =P

The rainstorm was crazy last week. Lots of rain just pouring down from the sky, and strong winds to boot. It really reminded me of the rain in Houston. Except there, that was pretty much the norm. Sad how with just a little bit of rain all of Vancouver seems to get all flooded. The drainage doesn’t seem very good. Come to think of it, none of Vancouver’s infrastructure seems adaquate. I blame it on you civil engineers… =P so you guys/girls who are in CIVL better improve it!

It was not a good day for my car… I was driving into shell to get some gas, but drove a bit too close to the island, where the curb had an oddly shaped outcropping that extended out on the corner. My rim slid up against it, and somehow the corner of the curb got wedged between two of my spokes. After getting out and looking at it a couple times and trying very very carefully to move it out without breaking the power steering, I finally wiggled it out. Final result? Some curb rash added to my already existing curb rash (which I think was there when I bought the car) and also scuffed paint in the middle of a spoke. Looks like I might be able to buff that one out through winter break…

With all the rain, though, comes snow on the mountains! Grouse and Cypress both opened this weekend. I can’t wait to go skiing again! We’re going on the YOURS trip on January 5th, 2007. Gonna be a blast! Maybe I should bring both my skis and my dad’s snowboard. I kinda want to learn to snowboard better since that’s what all the cool kids are doing. ^_~ But if I go to a resort, I don’t really want to waste it by falling all the time! So I’ll probably end up only skiing. Haha, I wanna try a double diamond this time… only done singles before. Hope I don’t die!

Canucks won last night. Against the Blues, that’s not the biggest surprise, but considering the fact that they lost all their games to the Blues last year, it’s a good sign! I find it really sad how the general Vancouver fan population seem to be bandwagon jumpers. As soon as the Canucks win a few in a row, they’re all happy and going “woohoo! Naslund for MVP!” Then as soon as they lose a couple, everyone’s saying Luongo sucks because he let in a few goals, Nonis sucks because he made trades, and Naslund sucks because he doesn’t smile.

Geez, give them a break! People are expecting these guys to be a cup winning team when they’re really in a transition phase! They just traded away like half their team, got a new goalie, new coach, and lost most of their defensemen to the cap! The team probably won’t be insanely good this year, but they’re not looking too bad, really. Outshooting their opponents pretty much every night is always a good thing.

But this team is going to shine in two or three years, when the Sedins and Luongo and Naslund will all still be signed on, and there will be Coulombe, Edler, Bourdon, and maybe Grabner and Kesler up front! Building a team doesn’t happen over night, or over a year for that matter. I think Nonis has done as much as a GM could possibly do. As a note, we have three second round draft picks at the next draft! Now there’s something we never had with Brian Burke.

Okay, last thing about hockey, I promise. We’ve got a pool going this year and it’s pretty exciting, actually. Everyone starts off with seven picks, and then we get two trades per week. Having all those players from other teams, it makes me actually interested in games other than the Canucks! It’s so addictive. I’m constantly looking for possible trades and moves that could make my team better in the future, even during labs when I have access to a computer. Sometimes it’s really luck, though.

I think there’s a curse on me. Whenever I trade for a player that everyone else has and is doing well, something bad happens to them. Like Martin Havlat. He was just lighting it up at the beginning, but I, as always wanting to be different, refused to get him. Then when he had gotten to like 700 points and grew by $2 million, I finally caved and got him. The very next day he gets injured. As a result, I lose something like $1.5 million, without getting a single point. See, this is why I always try to be different. It doesn’t work out when I don’t.

Okay enough about hockey, my video card’s fan is dying. I don’t know what it is with small fans in computers, but they have a habit of doing that. It’s making a lot of noise and generally sounds like it’s in a lot of pain. One day I took a nap, and woke up to the sound of barking. I looked all around, saw nothing, then went to the source of the sound, and sure enough, it was coming from inside my computer. The video chip fan had somehow transformed into a dog.

I called ATI and they gave me an RMA number for it, but I really can’t afford to be without my computer for ten days or more. I then called them and asked if they could cross-ship or send a fan or something but they refused. I think I’m going to have to just replace it myself. But the problem is that no one seems to make a fan that can fit around that big All-In-Wonder TV tuner that’s on my card.

That thing has caused me nothing but trouble. ATI’s software is absolute crap and has never worked properly, except way back when I bought it. After seeing that it worked well, they released software “updates” that promptly killed it. I actually recently found a solution to make it work on Windows Vista! Posted it on some forums as a HOW-TO and it actually helped some people! Hehe, feels good to be useful.

Ahem… so… midterms over, but everything else is far from over. Our collaborative research project for APSC 201 is due this Friday. We’re a bit behind and need to get quite a bit done, but we’re pretty much done writing the actual report, at least, which is good. I must say that being the group leader, I’m kinda disappointed in myself for letting us get behind like this. I said we’d stay ahead of the game and get things done early, but still here we are working on it during the last week. It’s going to need to be bound, and copyrighted (poorman’s method) and hopefully that all goes smoothly because there’s not a lot of time to fix mistakes.

In addition to that, our first Final is officially this week! It’s a lab course so I guess they’re allowed to put it before finals period. It’s a good thing, though, for the most part, because it means we only have to take six finals later instead of seven. Haha, the lab was actually a pretty fun experience this year. It wasn’t overly hard, and I think I learned quite a bit about electronics/electricity, in a practical sense, rather than in theory like from other courses.

Having just replaced my lowbeam headlights with Osrams ordered from England, one of the old lights I pulled off still worked, so I took it to the lab, and hooked it up to the power supply! We were surprised to find that the PSU could only squeeze out 2 amps, which was not even enough to get the bulb red, so we put two of them in parallel and ended up with a blinding light.

University makes life goes by so fast… I feel like summer didn’t end too long ago, yet here we are, with finals coming up fast. I have to wonder, is life passing me by? I’m really the type who wants to do as well as possible on everything I do, which in the case of school means focusing on it and working like mad most of the time. But what’s the point? Am I really better off trying to get decent marks than just making sure I pass, but also going out, having fun, you know, doing all those things you non-engineering students do?

Students seem to be afraid of changes. We’re young. We’re not too sure how to deal with them. But before long, life is going to become very constant and mundane (if we so choose), and we’re going to wish sometimes that we had these days back. Some say that we never really learn how to live a certain part of our life until that part is almost over. It’s a sad view but it seems rather true so far. I don’t want that to happen.

Well you’re magic he said
But don’t let it all go to your head
‘Cause I bet if you all had it all figured out
Then you’d never get out of bed

I can’t help but feel that with all these constant changes I just want something constant in my life that I can fall back on. Don’t know if it’s realistic to ask for, don’t even know if it really exists, but if it’s there then I want it…

But for now I’ll have to dream
About your smile cause you’re not
Here and all I want to say is
That I really miss you

Why does thinking about life in general cause so many headaches? I know that life is great in many respects and I’m quite thankful for that, but certain things are just troublesome. I used to just look away from those things, but that doesn’t solve anything, just makes me blind for a little while. So I’m trying to solve things and take control. My, I HAVE changed.

Are things really worth thinking about? Sometimes I get the feeling that I’m just wasting my time but somehow I think it’s worth it. Don’t ask me why, I just know. Haha, sounds hopelessly lost, doesn’t it.

1:40 AM and I still have 50 contacts online on my list. It’s definitely exam season…

The sun peeked out a little bit this morning, and I took the chance to go to Richmond Park with my stick and skates. I got the stick extended last week and have been waiting for the chance to try it out. It was pretty wet so it was hard to really skate around, avoiding the puddles, but it still felt good just cruising around. Those things I take for granted during the summer suddenly seem so valuable.

Absence makes the heart grow fonder… =P

Oh, almost forgot to mention! WongFu, the guys that produced “Yellow Fever” and some other possibly well-known internet videos are coming to UBC, and they’re bringing their feature length film, “A Moment With You” with them. I’ve got tickets to go! Wheee!

Remembrance day is today. Everyone comes and goes from the face of the earth, but some, it seems, far too soon.

A member of AT posted this tonight: “The sister of a friend was just murdered by her boyfriend, who in turn killed himself. Both of them were 18.”

Seems that it’s for no reason at all, sometimes. Always remember what’s truly important in life and always make sure the people you love most know it.

Remember me when I am gone away,
Gone far away into the silent land;
When you can no more hold me by the hand,
Nor I half turn to go, yet turning stay.
Remember me when no more day by day
You tell me of our future that you plann’d:
Only remember me; you understand
It will be late to counsel then or pray.
Yet if you should forget me for a while
And afterwards remember, do not grieve:
For if the darkness and corruption leave
A vestige of the thoughts that once I had,
Better by far you should forget and smile
Than that you should remember and be sad.

Remembrance Day… the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month. The memory of playing for the senior band and choir in the Remembrance Day service three years ago is still in my head like it was yesterday. It was such an incredibly powerful experience. The chords and tones of Kaddish are engraved into my mind, clashing, feeding the atmosphere in the packed gym where not one of the hundreds of students’ and teachers’ attentions wandered for even a second.

So what can WE do to not only to try to prevent more wars (a seemingly far-off goal, at which we have already failed) but to make things RIGHT?

“Richard Smith, AKA acemcmac on AT, at the age of 21, was struck and killed by a drunk driver at 2:30 AM Saturday morning, October 28, 2006 while crossing the street with a friend of his.”

Small world… two fellow ATers live right down the block from the scene of the accident, and more attended Penn State, from which Richard was an alumnus.

I thought that these things don’t happen to people I know. I had an idea that somehow there was a protective bubble that prevented anything like that from happening to those close to me, or indeed anyone in relation with me, but slowly I’m finding out that that’s not the case.

New objective in Math 265, Linear Differential Equations: Pass.

Argh…

A guy on a forum posted this… either his brain thinks on a completely different level than mine, or he had the help of some fine concoctions. It’s strangely intriguing to read, though.

It seems ignorance is indeed, on some level, blissful. I picture ignorance as being in a small room with a single lightbulb hanging from the ceiling. When I switch the light off at night, it is easy to locate the switch again when I arise, by slowly feeling my way around the walls till I feel the switch.

Lost now, I find myself in a black void. Lacking illumination and ground for which to place my feet, I fall. Or do I? No frame of reference can be seen with which I could place myself relative to some distant object. And so, I have now come full circle and returned to the start, ignorant of my place and motion, beginning and end. Yet, it does not resemble in the least the starting line. Then I realize the only knowledge I have gained is the awareness of my own ignorance. A pity indeed.

-CrazyHelloDeli

I was writing my blog in IE and somehow it just lost all of it mysteriously when I hit post.

Some lessons learned in the past week…

• Never use IE to write blogs.
• Never use IE, period.
• Do NOT try to sneak an elegantly constructed sentence into an APSC 201 report, because you will just have marks heavily docked, and be labelled an artsy.
• DO use short, grade one level sentences with ridiculous technical terms that don’t mean anything.
• DO downplay any risks to your company as much as possible. (ie, “Bridge construction concerns,” rather than “Catastropic bridge failure resulting in lots of death.”)
• Do not write a KCL for the output node of an operational amplifier. (NOOO WAAAAAY!!!)
• Appreciate the situation you’re in because you might never be in it again.
• Opportunity comes knocking all the time. You just have to step up and answer the call.
• Don’t stick a big sharp metal needle in a plastic bag, put it in your backpack, and expect it not to stab you.

It was a hectic week. Midterms completed: 8/12. Average mark so far: bad.

I got Final Fantasy XII. I’ve got a strange way of thinking. I’ve been in a sort of motivational rut in the past month or so now, just can’t find the energy to go out and do things quickly. Can’t find the motivation to finish things before 12:00 so I actually get some sleep. So I thought, maybe if I got FFXII, it’d motivate me to finish things so I would have time for it. But of course, that could backfire in lots of ways.

I installed Windows Vista. Not final version yet, but it’s pretty good. No major bugs I can see, drivers work well, and even games work! Pretty nice to use, and it’s faster than XP (it better be, after taking up 1.5 GB of RAM)

*sleeps*

Things just seem to have a way of happening exactly how you want them to happen sometimes. Almost like there’s some kind of link in a higher dimension.

Well, not always. =P But just at the most opportune times.

Guys think that when they get married they will get sex all the time.
Women want romance to continue.
Neither happens.
Guys don’t know how to hear what women are saying.
Women don’t know that guys are problem solvers rather than empaths.

Some pieces of truth found on a forum? Haha, seems to fit, but hey, always nice to prove things wrong. =P

It takes a thought to make a word
And it takes some words to make an action
And it takes some work to make it work
It takes some good to make it hurt
It takes some bad for satisfaction

It takes a night to make it dawn
And it takes a day to make you yawn brother
And it takes some old to make you young
It takes some cold to know the sun
It takes the one to have the other

And it takes no time to fall in love
But it takes you years to know what love is
And it takes some fears to make you trust
It takes those tears to make it rust
It takes the dust to have it polished

Life is Wonderful, Jason Mraz

This is the preliminary timeline our Dr. Nasiopoulos laid out for the week, in EECE 256:

• Tuesday October 24: Take a quiz, have tutorial, receive quiz back, sweat a bit
• Wednesday October 25: Go home, have a shower
• Thursday October 26: Take the midterm, sweat a lot

It’s so sad how it’s this early in the school year and people are pulling all nighters studying already. Well, I guess it’s not early since it’s getting to late-middle of the term, but still, finals are far off yet!

It’s even more sad that I’ve become one of the ones who work till 1 or 2 AM every night. Well, one thing I’ve learned… extra curricular activities don’t make up for rest time.

I think I’m getting sick. Been sniffling since the weekend and now my nose is running. But no tell-tale sign of a sore throat yet, though, so I’m hopeful.

Never realized how many people I really know! UBC used to be a big unfamiliar, unknown place, but now it seems like everywhere I go I can run into someone, or sit down somewhere where I feel at home. Think I’m getting over the talking to strangers thing… talking to random people every day now because it’s boring to just sit there and read. Haha, I think I freak people out, though. I’m sorry to all the people I freaked out. =P But hey, lots of people are coming up and talking to me randomly!

Sometimes I think being in engineering and sciences, we forget that people in other faculties have difficult courses and busy schedules and things to worry about too. Sometimes I wonder if we just make the jokes about artsies to make ourselves feel better about not being able to take any fun courses.

How does an oscilloscope work? The graph is amplitude vs time. And the centre is current time, making the left past time, and the right… future time?!?! I think we’ve just discovered the secret to predicting the future! And also the secret to time travel. Of course, to time travel, the option of travelling really fast backwards remains open.

Dance club is fun! I really do wish I had more time to devote to it and actually practice once in a blue moon. Don’t know if I should go to the dance on Friday! My outlook for the remainder of this week:

Thursday

1. EECE 280 Lab
2. APSC 201 Midterm
3. EECE 256 Midterm

Friday

1. Hand in EECE 251
2. Hand in MATH 263
3. Hand in CPSC 260

Saturday

1. Co-op workshop for 4 hours!!!
2. Do lots and lots and lots of homework

Sunday

1. Collapse
2. Sleep

Monday

• Wake up

Yeah…

A brief thought… I’m going to try to do everything completely opposite! Maybe that’d work. Must stray outwards…

Also must go to sleep. Averaging 6 hours of sleep a night is pretty indicative of how much I’ve lost control of my life! C’est horrible, ne? I’m sorry to all of you who get less than that. =P You’ve got my respect because I don’t know how you could ever survive.

Tomorrow is Wednesday! Happy day!

Upon moving into my new home here at wordpress, I have to say that I’m liking it! Liking it a lot. It looks pretty, I get to customize the look to some degree, and my posts get saved automatically, periodically!

Do you ever lie to get your way, and then when you finally get it, it doesn’t seem worth the lie anymore? I’m feeling that way… It’s not a huge deal and I’m not going to get caught for it, but my conscience is bothering me. Darn that old thing. ><

With no connection to the previous paragraph, aigh, my past two weeks have been just crazy. I feel like I’ve lost so much. Now I’m stuck here thinking about the what if’s, the could have’s, and the why’s. Of course the worst thing you could ever do is ask yourself “why”, but that doesn’t prevent me or anyone else from doing it anyway. Can’t seem to think of anything else. Everything reminds me of it. Especially everything at UBC. All I want is to go back… rewind…

Sometimes, it’s hard
To make things clear
Or know when to face the truth
And I know that the moment is here

I’ll open my heart
And show you inside
My love has no pride
I feel with you I’ve got nothing to hide

I don’t get it. I really don’t. Were we on completely different pages? How close was it, really? I thought we were so close, but maybe that was completely off the mark. I thought my mind and my heart were telling me the same thing, and I thought that was a concurrent feeling, but maybe that counts as a logic conflict? I don’t know, just don’t know what to do…

Busy school schedule isn’t helping either. I’ve found that my study and work habits have changed so much this year, and so has my grades. Swamped with work, I’m not being careful and trying to understand everything anymore. Just trying to get enough work done on time to make it through. I remember last year, I was totally Mr. Consistency, getting pretty much the same mark on everything! But so far on my midterms, I’ve either been getting 100%, or very poor. That’s good and bad… probably more bad than good.

Last Friday (not yesterday) Jonny and I went up to the roof of the parkade and did a photoshoot. No, not of ourselves! O.o Of our zoom zoom machines! In the morning thick fog was passing through the school and it seemed so close and vivid that you could grab it! I could literally see it passing by me on the other side of the street in little webs and curls, lazily but gone in an instant. In the afternoon when we got up there, the fog was still rolling around so we wasted no time and got the camera going immediately. In the middle of the shoot, the sun first peaked through the fog shyly, and then promptly broke out in all its glory, revealing the clear blue sky. It was really a good shoot. Follow this link if you want to see the products!

http://www.cardomain.com/ride/2153564/

As I said in my previous post, I got my class 5 license yesterday!! Let’s all get together and celebrate by driving slowly and cautiously! Haha, this morning I celebrated by going MTing with Gina and her friend. It was fun, but I realized that the game isn’t all that special. The fun of it is in interacting with other players.

Afterwards I drove over to Richmond Park and laced up the blades. It felt good to just skate, as fast as I possibly could. I spent fifteen minutes just standing there doing slapshots, hearing the stick crack as it slaps across the pavement and the ball thumping against the board. It felt good to be tired and out of breath, even though that was a sign of how out of shape I am, and it felt good to sweat and wipe away the sweat as it started running into my eyes.

That made my mood quite a bit better. Mood hasn’t been very good lately. Just been moping around thinking, staring off into space, and worrying about homework a lot. Gina’s helped with that a lot (thanks, Gina, if you read this!) and talking in general sort of helps, I guess. But sometimes it makes me no less confused.

The sun’ll come out
Tomorrow
So ya gotta hang on
‘Til tomorrow
Come what may
Tomorrow! Tomorrow!
I love ya Tomorrow!
You’re always a day away!

I see an opportunity, but honestly it’s not one I want to take. I don’t even really care it’s there because it’s not what I want… I am so screwed up…

So what have I been doing lately… I joined the UBC Dance Club (ballroom dancing) and we’re learning Cha Cha, Waltz, and Jive right now. It’s a bit easier learning slowly and learning all the basic steps and doing repetition, but I still feel like I have two left feet. Hehe, it’s okay, though. Interestingly, with some partners we seem to just click, and work, able to understand each other. Or maybe they’re just better at reading someone as confusing as me. Hehe. ^_^ There are way more girls than guys. The ads they placed were actually true. There are a few cute girls there too!

One day while I was walking on campus they were giving out Coke Blak! The new coke with caffeine injected into it. When it hit my lips, I felt instantly re-energized! Haha, talk about a placebo effect. It wasn’t that great, though. I don’t like coke, and straight up coffee tastes better than it. It came in a cool little glass bottle, though! My family still has a glass bottle of coke in its original packaging. Its been sitting for almost ten years. I wonder if they eventually explode if kept for too long.

I signed up for a ski trip! Leaving on January fifth. Somehow it feels wrong to play right at the start of school, but I couldn’t resist the opportunity of a trip like that, especially not to an interior mountain! I’ve never gone to Silver Star before. So excited! And when I joined the club, YOURS, I got a nice little binder thingy, water bottle (which I traded with my brother for his big one), hand warmer, and membership card!

I got a new webcam! I swear, getting new stuff is therapeutic. Not necessarily the act of shopping, which girls seem to get some kind of strange forbidden pleasure out of, but getting brand new, shiny things is just the greatest sometimes! Haha, I know, I’m materialistic. But in the last month, we’ve gotten so much stuff! Webcam, portable hard drive, large CF card, digital camera, laser printer because the fuser in my old one broke, and a set of those amazing pens from Japan. Now I can take notes in style, once again. I was running out of black. I was on my last pen, and getting very worried. This set should last me another two years or so.

The new printer we got is really great. My mom wanted a color laser, but I wasn’t sold on it. It was huge, costed $320 to replace the toner cartridges, and generally didn’t give me a good feeling. So I wasn’t disappointed to find that Futureshop had run out of stock the day I went to buy it. Afterwards I went to Staples and grabbed the HP-2070N. It ’s really a great printer. I’ve got it set up now as a network printer so that it’s completely independent of the computers, connected through the router. It’s quite fast, and prints nice color. I like the fact that it feeds from a tray rather than a top loading stack.

I can’t wait to get my purple license in the mail either. And I ordered a red engineering jacket a long time ago. It’s about time it came.

Gah, I can’t believe I spent so long blogging. There’s a ridiculous amount of stuff to do this week. Two midterms, and my first draft of my section of our technical paper is due. But I just don’t have the motivation.

Yesterday, I took my class five road test at 3:15 PM; also known as rush hour. After waiting a while reading the paper, I got called up and introduced myself as “Cloud”. My examiner introduced himself as “Rob” so we got the ball rollin’ immediately, stepping outside and towards my bright yellow car. He noted upon entering that the interior was squeaky clean, thanks to the 303 Aerospace Protectant I applied a couple weeks ago. Score! Bonus points! Detailing really is addictive.

We rolled out, after mirror checking, shoulder checking, and checking everything throroughly, and I promptly let the clutch out too quickly and almost stalled on the crosswalk. Haha, thankfully I didn’t though. Turning onto Boundary, the light changed yellow just before I entered the intersection at a low speed, and I hit the brake for a second but realized it was too late and kept going. So at this point I’m getting pretty nverous. Completing the turn brought us right into a brutal traffic jam, on the big hill passing under the grandview highway.

Upon stopping and shifting into neutral waiting in line for the light to change, he pointed out that I could just leave the car in gear, and keep my foot on the clutch. So I’m thinking, okay, I’ll do that just to humour him this time. Easier said than done! After holding it down for half a minute, my leg started shaking. He obviously either has a much stronger leg than mine, or only drives Hondas with soft, short throw clutches. When we finally got going again, the car rolled back a significant amount, and when I let the clutch out, I got clutch chatter, but luckily not too bad a case. At this point, though, I’m thinking it’s not a very good start to a road test.

Then on Boundary, he tells me to turn left at the next light. Well I signal, but as I approach, notice that there’s a no left turn sign, so I say that and keep going. Then he says okay turn at the next one, and as once again as I approach with my signal going I see that it’s a T intersection, where there’s no street to even turn into! And then he goes “woops, we must have passed it” and I’m thinking, huh… okay. So we take the next left where finally a legal turn can be made, and go around the area at 50 and 30 getting people rather angry. We stopped at a dead end street at one point, and did a three point turn, once again checking all around many times.

Things got better, though. Later we went through the Burnaby Central and deer lake parkway area, which was some easy driving, me being so familiar with it. During hazard perception, though, a guy saw fit to run a stop sign, crossing in front of me where I had no stop sign, and then promptly stopping in the middle of the intersection. I chuckled, and pointed, saying “hazard”. Haha, I think the examiner was rather amused as well, in an ironic way. I took the kensington on-ramp onto #1 highway, going the entire time at 30 km/h. It felt absolutely ridiculous. Memories of flying around that banked spiral on a nice sunny day crossed my mind. I was pretty surprised that the guy behind didn’t honk! But as soon as the lane straightened out, it was hard throttle all the way, taking third gear to 4500 rpm, which I generally don’t do (yes, I know, I granny it ). Exiting was a much bigger headache. He made me take the willingdon north exit, where there’s no merging lane, just an abrupt entrance to the street with cars flying down, off the bridge in a hurry. I waited until there was a very large gap, just to be sure.

So that route brought me back to the licensing centre, where he told me I passed, I got my picture taken, shook his hand, and went off happily!

It’s a new blog! My old MSN Spaces blog will no longer be updated. Thanks, everyone, for the good times there! Thanks for the comments, and make sure you leave links to your own blog! (if you’re comfortable with that)