Fear the Crab

Today was a normal day at school, except for the fact that I found out the Legislature has cut the budget for the ICS department, meaning that there will be less professors and less classes for me to take. Considering the amount of students already in the program (and likely entering the program in the future), the chances aren’t looking good for me to get into a class. Compound that with the fact that I register last, and there’s a problem. I won’t know the full extent of this problem until next semester, though.

Feeling particularly tired, likely due to the constant early rises I’ve had to endure these past two weeks. Four to six hours of sleep aren’t enough to someone used to a full eight. At least today I cut back on the coffee and instead loaded up on energy via orange juice and breakfast food from the school cafeteria. Their scrambled eggs were very fluffy and delicious, and of course a breakfast meal can’t be complete without fried rice, portuguese sausage and spam.

Narrowed my choices down to either the Toyota Tacoma or the Nissan Frontier. Both are comparable in terms of quality and maintenance, with some differences in power and handling. I think it will eventually boil down to how much all those extra options will raise the price. Now the research turns to finding out those facts.

Today I did absolutely nothing, and it was everything I could have hoped it would be. Actually, I did putter around online for a good bunch of hours, but was idle time since my homework for the day was done. Took a nap, spent a little time with Titan, ate some steak for lunch and some pizza for dinner, and that was about it.

Maile, on the other hand, had a lot of homework. Most of what she had to do was all from her history class. I remember one of the self-test questions being “Why slavery in Mesopotamia is enlightened?” I have no idea what that question is asking. Is it saying that the concept of slavery is enlightened, or the slaves are enlightened? Without any understanding of the question, perhaps the only hope is that the rest of the class doesn’t get it, forcing the professor to remove it.

Must try and sleep tonight; tomorrow’s another early riser.

Started off the day on four hours of sleep. That’s what happens when I get off of work at 2315 and turn off the lights at 0000, only to wake up at 0400 to get ready for school. The waking up wasn’t too bad, actually. I think the primary motivation is that I really need to attend every class, and can’t write it off like how I did in my younger years.

One cup of coffee in the morning, followed by a cafe mocha at 0700. Another cafe mocha at 0900, and by 1100 I had to pee like I could see through time. I actually felt my body shrink after using the bathroom for the fourth consecutive time, and whoever said eating asparagus made it stink has never drunk three cups of coffee. All that caffeine can’t be doing good things for my body, but at least I stayed awake through all my classes.

When I got home I immediately came down from that high. It was not pleasant. I was barely coherent and all my thoughts were jumbled and garbled like encrypted packets sent through a 28.8 modem. I apologize for the computer reference, but after a full day of nothing but, it’s understandable that it’s all I can think of right now.

A bit of good news, though; I finally managed to find that one song that had eluded me for years. I hear it on commercials, in movies, and every which way I turn. It sounds cool, but I never knew the name nor the composer until today. The song I was looking for all this time was “O Fortuna,” from Carmina Burana, composed by someone named Carl Orff. I actually don’t know if Carmina Burana is an opera or somesuch, as different locations would list different things and not in any clear manner. It also appears there is a band (or another song) named O Fortuna, but I avoided those links. After years of searching, I’ve finally found what I’ve been looking for, and now I feel highly accomplished.

The Toyota Tacoma is looking rather expensive. As an alternative, I may research the Nissan Frontier. I’ll have to see what the reviews say; it may not be worth it to go the cheap route, especially if it only hampers me down the road with repairs.

I’m going to turn in early tonight. Regardless of whether or not I’ve said that already, it only lends more evidence to support that decision.

Today was a busy day for the store. There were a lot of customers, and a lot of purchases, making the night quite a productive one. Add in the fact that Mondays are run nights and it’s easy to imagine how busy everybody was. The rush didn’t die down until 2200, so I took that opportunity to take a break.

Spoke with a few people about my interest in the Tacoma, and so far everyone agrees that it’s a worthwhile purchase. It’s making me feel better about my choice.

Maile is having a few problems in submitting her assignment online. It seems there aren’t any step-by-step instructions on how to do it, and there’s no way of knowing (so far as we can tell) whether or not the assignment was received. It’s not due until the 11th, so Maile has a lot of time to email the professor and ask for instructions. Perhaps there’s a page we’ve missed, or something that helps describe the submission process, but if it’s hard to find, then that’s merely more evidence to our request that it be easy to understand. There’s nothing worse than completing the assignment and turning it in, only to find out the professor never got it.

I’m pretty sure there are other people in the class who are having similar problems. If enough students complain, perhaps the professor will upgrade the submission process.

I’m feeling awake right now. That is not good, since I have to be up in 4 hours to get ready for school.

Maile is doing well with her homework, especially for her psychology class. Her paper/proposal assignment is progressing well, and all she has left to do is find the right set of words to properly describe her agenda. She came up with a great topic for a survey, that of what those in the medical profession think about euthanasia. This assignment is not due until Tuesday, giving her plenty of time to “touch up” her words for greater efficiency. I only wish my math homework could be like that.

Speaking of math homework, I must rewrite my assignment so that it’s legible and organized. Right now it’s a jumble of notes and scribbles as I wracked my brain to try and figure stuff out. I have arrows pointing to whatever free space there was, where I wrote additional notes or solutions. I don’t even know if any of them are correct.

Irene found out today that she has been selected for jury duty. Normally one would think it a golden opportunity to play god with another person’s life, but in this case Irene does not want to go. The selection process is scheduled for Monday the 23rd of September, and Irene has a full day of classes. As I am also a student at the UH, I can sympathize with her plight. It is difficult to miss even one day’s worth of classes when the material is quite important to one’s impending graduation. I’m not even sure if the professor’s would understand. Still, I told her to talk to her profs and see if they can either suggest how she can get out of jury duty, or find some way to give her the materials beforehand. There is, of course, the chance that she may not be selected to serve on the actual panel, but she would still have to go that first day, which loops us back to the main problem.

Today’s Invader Zim episode(s):
Invasion of the Idiot Dog Brain
Bad, Bad Rubber Piggy

Work was interesting, but only because of the conversations I was able to have. There was a little toddler boy who really really wanted a mini-recorder keychain, so badly in fact that he tried to break the glass door with his tiny fist when his mom finally dragged him out crying.

I got my first homework assignment for ICS 211. I had to make a web page, which will be the starting point for all those Java applets we are planning to make. The simplicity of this assignment is lulling me into a false sense of security; I’m trying to force myself to believe that it’s not going to be a cakewalk, just so I can take it seriously.

As far as ICS 241 goes, I finally managed to complete the first assignment. I don’t think it’s 100% correct, but at least I did what I could to the best of my understanding.

I helped Maile try and figure out why her printer isn’t displaying its status window. At first I thought it was because XP was installed over the printer drivers, but after I removed and reinstalled the drivers, that darn status window still didn’t show up. The printer still works, though.

Tonight’s UH football game:
Eastern Illinois – 36
Hawaii – 61

Not much to say about today. Work was the same, with nothing exciting happening nor was there anything worthwhile, significant, or contemplative enough to warrant an entry.

Talked to Maile on my break, and that made my day better. I told her that I was leaning towards the Toyota Tacoma as my new mode of transportation. I still have to do more research into the matter, but at least now I have a direction. Once I have acquired all the relevant information, I will then need to weed out the “fluff” that normally comes with advertising or self-promotion. However, it’s highly likely there’s a review web site out there that can give me objective information about the Tacoma.

Interestingly enough, Tacoma is where I went to college.

Tonight’s Invader Zim episode:
Bolognius Maximus

I have discovered that a half hour can make a whole lot of difference in regards to the morning rush hour. On Tuesday I left the house at 0615 hours and it took me about an hour to get to campus. Today I left at 0530 and showed up within 20 minutes. From now on, I plan to wake up at 0400 on school nights so I don’t have to sit in traffic. Now I really have to consider changing my hours on Mondays.

If I’ve never said it before, I’ll say it now; I hate math. Linear algebra, geometry, those I’m fine with. Stuff like what I’m getting into makes my head full. I can actually feel my brain pulse and get all fuzzy when I’m trying to comprehend stuff like mathematical induction. My head is so unhinged I can’t even describe induction here.

I officially made a fool of myself in 211. The prof is a big stickler for audience participation, going so far as to give points for it. We were reviewing basic Java concepts, and we came to the subject of while-loops and for-loops. She asked, “How many times will a for-loop initialize?” I know about for-loops, so I raised my hand, and was called to answer. Unfortunately, I misheard the question to be, “How many time will a for-loop run?” so I answered, “At least once.” I was corrected with the answer that it is just once. Not at least. Only once.

Well, my answer was “sorta” correct. And at least I’ve made myself known to the professor. The question remains whether or not I got a point for “effort,” or a neutral, which doesn’t affect my participation at all.

George left a message on my cell phone, at around 1920 hours according to the time stamp. He was hanging out with some old friends, Chanelle and Kandi (from what I understood of the message). Unfortunately, I got the message perhaps 2 hours later, and considering that I had been up since 0400 I was feeling quite beat. It’s too bad; I would’ve like to have gone. Haven’t seen those two girls in ages.

Today was the first day of instruction for me, and it went as how I had expected. The math class (ICS 241 – Discrete Mathematics) is as fast-paced as 141, but at least this time the professor takes some time to explain just exactly how we’re supposed to solve things. It’ll take a while to see how well I’ll actually do in the class, however.

ICS 211 seems the same as 111 last semester; highly instructional and step-by-step. They don’t expect us to know everything, which is a big relief, and they’ll concentrate on actually teaching us something we’ll use later. The professor has a semi-thick Spanish accent, but is still understandable, and looks to be a lot of fun. The odds are looking good that I’ll do well in this one, provided I concentrate on working.

I also figured out how to work my wireless internet card, thanks to the helpful staff at the IT department. I downloaded some updated drivers and configured the card as per the University network. It seems my firewall then became the root cause of the problem, as it was blocking the signals for some strange reason. I told Maile that it seemed as though I had to do a little ritual each time I wanted the card to work; disable the firewall, disable the LAN, disable the wireless network connection, enable the wireless network connection, dance the “macarena,” and attempt to log on. I still don’t know if those are the right steps to do, but perhaps if I dance to the Bee Gee’s song “You Could Be Dancing” things might work better.

I may have to get a new car. My engine’s making strange noises, and this time around I’m not sure if it’s still the air conditioner, or some other problem. Regardless, the cost of repairs is starting to add up, and perhaps it’s time to move on. I can’t believe I even have to consider this, though, as Toyotas are generally known to be low-maintenance. I wonder if it’s because I have to drive into town, in heavy traffic, practically every single day. If I do get a new car, I am faced with the dilemma of what to actually get. Do I want another sedan? Should I go for something more “manly” and get a truck? Or something in-between, like an SUV? I also don’t know if I should stick with Toyotas, which tend to be among the more pricey of imports, or switch to Nissan, whose cars seem to have a good track record in regards to maintenance (from what I’ve seen and heard; many of my relatives own Nissans). The only thing I know for a fact is that I’m not going to buy American, as I have had bad experiences with American-made cars. European is definitely out of the question, too.

Well, for now, that’s just something to consider. I still have more important things to concern myself with, such as the homework that’s due next week.

Today was another boring day. Same old same old at work, it being Monday and a run night. The duty free run was surprisingly light, but that only meant I had more time to be bored.

Maile thinks it odd that I think about her a lot. I say it’s probably the only thing that’s keeping me sanely quirky.