Were you aware that Wild Cherry Pepsi contains no juice. It certainlly came as a shock to me. </sarcasm> I mean, really, why the need to put such a notice on there? Do people really believe that there's juice in cherry pop? Has our society stooped to a level that it's actually necessary to put such disclaimers on things? It totally baffles me.
Wow... last semester as an undergrad, and possibly my last semester at good old Iowa State. I can hardly believe it's already been 4 years, time has literally flown by. Talk about cushy senior schedule this semester though. My earliest class (not counting my one recitation) isn't until 12:30pm. One class on Monday/Wednesday, 3 classes on Tuesday/Thursday, and I don't have any class or work on Friday. It's pretty sweet. The classes I'm taking aren't all that bad either: 19th Century Art History, Principals of Programming Languages, Philosophy of Technology and independent study for Game Design and Development. All in all it should be a pretty fun semester.
I've got all my applications in to graduate schools. I ended up applying to Iowa State University (ISU), University of Pennsylvania (UPenn), Carnegie Mellon University (CMU), and Georgia Tech (GTech). Now I get to sit and play the waiting game... not my most favorite of games. I'm still really pulling for UPenn, but I'm not betting on it. My only sure bet at this point is ISU and some days I'm not even to sure about that.
That's about it right now. Graduating in May, hopefully I'll get in to grad school somewhere, if not I suppose I could get a job ;) Life is good and I couldn't be happier.
Seems as though my post has ruffled some feathers. Haha suckers! Wouldn't you all just love to know what that was all about. I'm sure some of you do, but others of you don't. Alas poor York! As for me, I'll continue to sit here on cloud nine. :D
I seriously hate being right sometimes... it would be so nice to be wrong for a change. I feel like we've been beating a dead horse for the last 2 and a half weeks to no avail. In the words of Dr. McCoy "He's dead, Jim."
In other news I got my recommendation forms out today and have most of my personal statement written. I just need to put a few polishing touches on it for each school and get everything sent off. Staying here wouldn't be so bad, especially if someone else fights my funding battle for me... I still don't know, it's a tough decision. For now I just need to get all that stuff in and think about it later... like if I get any acceptance letters back.
Only one more week until the end of the semester! Have a couple projects left to finish up, and then studying until I can't see straight... but I'm done technically by next Wednesday, but really by Tuesday afternoon. Hooray! I shouldn't really be getting too excited. Next semester, even though I only have 12 credits, is still going to be busy. I'm taking 19th century art history, game design and development (yes, again. I'm a masochist), principles of programming languages, and philosophy of technology. It's going to be fun. In the mean time I need to finish this semester's courses, figure out what I'm getting all the pains in my ass on my Christmas list for Christmas, and write my annual Christmas/End of the Year letter. Busy busy busy busy busy all the time. But if I wasn't I wouldn't know what to do with myself.
... though there are a handful of artists who are lucky they're not. The last 3-4 weeks have been a total whirlwind. Physics and CprE exams went all right. I made it through the GREs without dying. I actually did better on the real thing than I did on any of the practice exams I took. I should get my official scores back sometime this week, and then along with writing my personal statement and getting my recommendation forms to people I can finish up my grad applications. The more I think about it the more staying here doesn't seem all that bad. Steve, my game dev prof, is trying really hard to get me to stay. Yesterday he proposed 2 different TA jobs I could potentially have if I were to stay and do HCI here. One of the big reasons I don't want to stay here, other than the obvious of that I've lived in Iowa all my life, is HCI grad students have to have funding or they're not accepted, and I don't want to fight for funding. So Steve has taken it upon himself to fight for funding for me, even though I may not stay. I must admit, it is nice having someone want you stay enough that they put forth extra effort to make it possible and easy.
Which brings us to Grimm... wonderful Grimm that has been owning my life. Long story short, we failed, the artists screwed us. The programmers spent 6ish days straight, at about 12-14 hours per day in the Bunker working to get done on time, not to mention all the time spent individually working and the weekly meetings. Grimm was supposed to be complete Wednesday, November 16th at 2am for IGF. It wasn't even close because we had no art. The artists assumed that since their models were complete and textured that they were done... that they didn't have to worry about exporting, and they didn't have to worry about making sure everything looked right and was to scale, not to mention they didn't get "finished" until sometime late Tuesday. But we had a "magic installer" that went out and checked a server for updates before installing. So a new hard deadline was set for the artists to have everything exported and usable and then the programmers were going to finish the last little bits Friday before Thanksgiving break and everything was going to be happy... yeah, totally didn't happen. Important stuff that we (the programmers) needed more than anything else wasn't exported, and to make matters even worse, the server that all the art was on was down when we came in Friday. Luckily we got in contact with the guy who maintains it right before he left town and got what we needed off of it. Unfortunately it was to no avail, Steve and I spent about 2 hours putzing around trying to get the physics terrain to export, but had to give up because the only lab we could use was closing. So we gave it up. Yesterday we were informed that we have to finish by next Wednesday because we're presenting to people who might want to give us money. So the artists have been given a new deadline of 2pm tomorrow to have everything exported and in working order, and then Friday afternoon/evening the programmers are going to finish the beast up. I have little faith in the artists at this point, but I want to get Grimm "done"... I don't want to spend another fruitless day in the Bunker and have nothing to show for myself or my team... artists included. I could go on and on about the stupid shit the artists did, but if I did that I wouldn't get any sleep, and I need sleep.
So with that I'm going to put a close on this rant with the promise of better posts in the upcoming weeks. I'm hoping to get my graduate applications completed by this weekend to mid next week, and I'm done with finals 2 weeks from today. (Hooray!) Then it'll be over and I'll be able to breathe again... Pooh sticks.
(12/01/05) Edit: In response to an anonymous comment I received from what I can only assume is one of the Grimm artists: I am well aware of the break down of communication amongst the Grimm team. I am also aware of the total disregard for styles, requests, directions and deadlines of certain parties. I realize that allot of the people working on Grimm put in countless hours, but on the same token there are those who assumed their work was done when it wasn't, didn't stick around to make sure it was all ok, and made little effort to remedy it. On that same train of thought, this should be a learning experience for all of us, unfortunately I don't feel that some people have gotten anything out of this experience nor care to. When working on a team project everyone needs to not only get their part done, but stick around to the very end and be willing to fix any errors or mistakes. And maybe, just maybe, you might have to put in a little more work and go out of your way to learn something new on your own. In the real world you can't expect to have someone spell out for you step by step how to do something or how something works. In the real world we all would have been fired. Luckily for all of us we're doing this in a safe, learning environment where we're allowed to screw up, fall on our faces and fail miserably. To put it bluntly, my issue with the art team as a whole is not the lack of understanding of the exporting and integration process, but the lack of wanting to understand and the attitude of "What do you mean my stuff doesn't work? You must have broke it, it's your fault, you fix it." This by no means applies to all the Grimm artists, but it does apply to some. Sometimes in life the good get lumped in with the bad.
Deinse,
Thank you for the submittal of your form letter. As you can imagine, we recieve a high volume of form letters, and are unable to personally respond to each of them. Never the less, we do appreciate your effort at communicating, and encourage you to continue. You might also try other methods such as Instant Messenger (we can provide links to appropriate clients for this if you need them) or even the old fashioned but always loved telephone.
Again, thank you for your coorsponednce.
Parental Units, Inc.
(this response was auto generated. responding to it may or may not reach anyone human).
I've heard of packing peanuts, but I've never heard of or seen packing Skittles. It's all my crazy mother. I asked Dad to send me my games (Myst and Riven) from home and my mom got ahold of the box and I guess decided that Skittles would make a great packing material. So she put some in those little snack sized zippy bags, and I'm guessing there were about 4 bags in there. It was kind of hard to tell because the bags exploded during shipping and there were Skittles all over the inside of the box. But it was kinda fun digging all the Skittles out to get to my games. Alas, I have no time to play, but eventually I will have to for a project. Ah, having to play a game so I can do homework :). And I have Skittles! Dad says little round candies should have chocolate or peanutbutter in them. But I love the little Skittles! I love them good! I need them or I will explode! That happens to me sometimes.
Actually Grimm makes me a little less grim today as compared to yesterday. Yesterday was brutal. I spent all evening attempting to implement this CEGUI stuff in Ogre3D. It does not play nicely. It doesn't help that it's poorly documented, and all the tutorials that do exist all use the demo code which doesn't really work well in an actual game. But good news is CEGUI is going bye bye!! I almost did the happy dance right there in the Bunker, but refrained because I knew I'd get laughed at. A few of us programmers on the project met after class and talked about things and decided we could do a "GUI" using some of the Ogre libraries, namely Overlays, MouseMotionListener and MouseListener. It shouldn't be too bad, though I still have a couple things to figure out, like how to load a material and what a material is. I'm really hoping that's not going to be too hard, I've spent enough time this week banging my head against the desk. Stupid GUI and it's importance to the look and feel of the game! :P
So as some of you may know I will on occasion, especially after spending many hours there, say that I'm allergic to Atanassoff, the computer science building. I have news for you for those of you who have scoffed at me and told me I'm crazy and that it's all in my head. I very well may be allergic to the building. I was talking to Gloria, the undergrad adviser, and it turns out that the building has closed air circulation to reduce the cost of heating and cooling. This isn't unusual by any means, but the current air has been in there 10ish years, and black or blue-green mold has started growing on some of the ceiling tiles in the basement, and possibly other parts of the building. Penicillin comes from the blue-green mold Penicillium notatum, and I'm allergic to amoxicilln which just so happens to be part of the penicillin family. So it's no wonder that after about 30 minuets to an hour of being in the computer labs in Atanassoff that I get all stuffy, sneezy and coughy. The mold probably isn't the only contributing factor. I'd be willing to bet there's a fair amount of dust and other things that I'm most likely allergic to that also help set me off. It's not a good thing that I'm allergic to the building because I spend a lot of time there, but at least now I know I'm not crazy in thinking that I am.
Basketball season starts in 18 days!!!!! I got my season tickets yesterday, it was so exciting! I can hardly wait. I love basketball season. It's the most wonderful time of the year. So I've already scoped some of the preseason rankings, and I must say we are sorely underrated. ESPN has us ranked 22 in the preseason pole, and something I read elsewhere has us finishing 6th in the Big 12. I'm calling bullshit, especially since ESPN has Iowa ranked 16th. They totally don't give us the credit we're do. We probably have one of the best backcourts in the nation, Blalock and Stinson rock! I'll give them that our frontcourt is a little shaky with Homan graduating, hopefully we'll have a good new big guy to take care of things. Hopefully I'll have time on Saturday to go to the shootout and scope out the team and the new players. Regardless of what the critics say, I'm psyched for the new season. I've got season tickets and from what I've read it looks like it's going to be a good and exciting season. Go Cyclones!
I was walking to the library tonight to go meet with my group to finish up our proposal for English (ugh), and I was between the library and Atanssoff when I see.... two racoons crawling out of the gutter. They were so cute, they looked like weird, fat little kitties. One of them gave me this funny look, and I wasn't sure if it was going to hiss or meow at me. Then they both slunk under a car as I walked by. Racoons are neat, and kinda scary, and they make me think of shiny things. They do this because, racoons like shiny thigns, and I like shiny things. Sometimes my mom makes fun of me because I like shiny things and get shiny object stupor like a racoon. Ashley laughs at me too when I'm channel surfing and they're showing shiny things on QVC or something I almost always get stuck and have to pause and watch for a few minutes until the annoyingness of their voices infiltrates my brain. What can I say, I love shiny things. Anyway... highlight of my day -- seeing racoons crawling out of the gutter by Atanassoff!
Yesterday is but a dream, tomorrow but a vision. But today well lived makes every yesterday a dream of happiness, and every tomorrow a vision of hope. Look well, therefore, to this day. - Sanskrit Proverb
Work like you don't need money, love like you've never been hurt, dance like no one's watching, learn like you'll to live forever, and live like you'll die tomorrow.
And the biggie:
Don't take life too seriously. You'll never get out of it alive. - Elbert Hubbard
So it feels like forever since I last posted, but really it hasn't been that long. I think it's just that this has been a really really long week. Kind of the too much to do and not enough time to do it all in. I seriously think we need like 36 hour days, that way I could actually get my 8 hrs of sleep plus still have 28 hours to work.... wow 28 hours a day to work on stuff... that would be fantabulous. This having too much to do, and having group projects where part of the group doesn't do any work, or doesn't let any one else know that they've done any work till class time the day it's due, really eats up a lot of time. You spend time doing not only your part of the project, but theirs too because you don't already know they've done it. Really makes me mad, and it eats up a lot of time I should be working on other things. There are two other pretty big things I need to be working on, and unfortunately they're both "due" about the same time. I take GRE's Nov 10th, and Grimm is due Nov 15th. Those are my two really big things right now, and most of the time I don't feel like I have enough time for either, let alone one or the other.
The GRE's are especially plaguing me, I have no time to study for them, and if I don't do well there's no way I'm going to get into grad school. I'm not sure that even if I do do well on them I'll get in. Most days I think I probably won't because I'm pretty sure I won't do well enough on the GRE's to compensate for everything else. It's really going to come back and bite me in the ass too, because I'm putting off applying and interviewing for jobs so I can focus more on grad school, but I'm not having enough time to do grad school either. It's like my classwork is eating up all my time this semester, and I can't afford to let that happen. And the worst part is it really is all classwork, I haven't even had time to just go chill with my friends the last couple weeks. Consequently some of them are a little ticked at me because they feel like I'm just blowing them off, when in reality I'm blowing everybody off. That just makes things worse, because not only do I not get to hang out with my friends, but some of them make me feel guilty about it. The only time I get to see anybody is if it's in class or class related. Grrr! I don't know what to do. I'll probably end up working myself crazy so I have a better chance at the GRE's. In reality, no matter what I do it'll be wrong. If I take time to chill with my friends that's time I don't study and time I don't get much needed sleep. On the flip side if I study all the time I don't get to see anyone, and then people get upset with me. Pretty much a lose lose situation.
So I don't have anything real or significant, just a few funny odds and ends. It has been decided that fobonics/chinglish/engrish, is probably one of the most hysterical spoken languages. And as most of you probably already know All Your Base Are Belong To Us is probably the funniest and most popular video demonstrating this. Also notably it has a very well documented and fairly long Wikipedia article which I find entertaining because it's so pointless.
Other random bits of entertainment:
So I got this email today from WiSE (Women in Science and Engineering) today and there's some seminar series (which I will most likely not attend) about learning about yourself and choosing a job path. To sign up for this seminar series they first want you to take the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator, and I was a little bored, curious and it was only gonna take me 5-10 min so I took it. Turns out I'm a INTJ - Introverted Intuitive Thinking Judging. A Mastermind Rational if you will. It doesn't explain why I am the way I am, but it does explain some of the "rational" behind some of the things I say and do... or don't say or do, depending on the situation.
In other news I'm about 90% sure I want to go to grad school, and I think I want to go for Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) or some sort of computer graphics/game technology sort of master. Google and I have been digging around for schools with such programs, and I've got quite a list, but I'm having a slightly difficult time narrowing it down to my top 5 or so. There are 3 that really stand out: Carnegie Mellon, University of Pennsylvania, and Georgia Tech. And actually, when I got to looking at it ISU's HCI program isn't too shabby. I'll apply here, but mostly as a backup, I kind of feel like it's time for me to go and leave wonderful old l'Ames. Some others I'm looking into a little more are Purdue, Michigan, Virginia Tech, Washington University and DePaul. I dunno... I'm slowly getting there, which scares me, seems like I'm not moving on this stuff quickly enough. I really need to get on the ball if I want this to happen. Yeah, things will work out, but only if I push them... nothing is just going to magically fall into place. But the motivation is kicking in, so that's good. There are a few people's brains I'd like to pick about the matter, and I'll get to that too, which will help resolve a lot of this. I think it's all coming together finally.
I seriously need to stop writing so late... I start to lose all train of thought and end up sounding like a bumbling idiot. I guess that's not really much different than any other time of day though :)
So, it's kind of been slowly sinking in for a while now, but hit a little harder today, that I graduate in about 7 months and I have no idea what I'm going to do or where I'm going ot go. For some reason answering questions at freshmen seminar really got me thinking that I have no plan, and no idea what's going to happen... and it scares me. And a lot of the problem is I don't really have anyone, or feel like I have anyone, I can talk to this about. Part of me really wants to go to grad school and get my masters, but the other part of me questions what I would do with it. I honestly don't know, I don't know what I want to do. I really hate uncertainty, it makes me nervous. And everybody tells me it'll all work out... but for everything to work out I need to make some decisions and for some reason that's really hard. Ideally I would both apply for jobs as well as take the GRE's and apply to grad schools, but I just don't see time for all of that. Both are rather intensive processes, and for grad school, most universities have a deadline of January or February 1st. If I do decide to do the grad school route I need to figure out what I want to do. UPenn has a really cool masters program, CGGT (Computer Graphics and Game Technology), which is new, and is very much in my area of interest. At the same time it's very narrow and I think maybe HCI (Human Computer Interaction) would be a better way to go. The more I think about it the more I think grad school is where I want to go, but on the same token having a real job would nice. Being a student wears on you, granted there's "less work" when you're a grad student, but it's just work/homework in a different sense. With a job, your work typically falls between the hours of 8am and 6pm, at which point you're done and can spend the rest of your time how you like... that and you actually have real money in your pocket. Being a semi-poor college student, as most of you probably know, gets kind of old. I don't know, I never thought I'd actually be having the debate with myself about grad school. I always thought I'd do my undergrad in 4 years, get a job, and be done with school. But now that I'm at that point, I.... I like school, and I like learning, and I kind of want to continue for a couple more years. Get a little more specialized, more focused. I need to get it figured out, get all my little ducks in a row and get going on things... but I'm just so torn. Most employers will pay for, or do tuition reimbursement, for their employees to go to grad school, but that's typically under the stipulation that you go for something that would contribute to your job. I'm not sure that what I want to do would fall under that category. I'm pretty sure it wouldn't in most cases. Ultimately it boils down to I don't know what I should do. The more I think about it the more it seems like I should go to grad school... but part of me keeps saying I'm just putting of part off my life by doing that. I guess that really isn't that big of a deal though, I've been putting off certain parts of my life for years, but I'm not going to get into that. *sigh* This obviously isn't going to get resolved tonight, so the internal battle will continue to rage. Any advice, opinions etc. are welcome... the best would be someone to talk to who is going through this, or has gone through this, but I don't see that happening. Oh well.
The following conversation is a loose recap of the conversation that occurred while working on physics pre-lab:
Me: *sneeze*
Ooly: Did you know every sneeze is equivalent to one quarter of an orgasm
Me: What? So does that mean if you sneeze 4 times you've in effect orgasmed?
So I totally love Boheme. It is like the best place ever. Couple weekends ago we went to Club Element for Leah's birthday... and it... well bluntly it pretty much sucked. The atmosphere was terrible, music wasn't that great... I dunno, Boheme kind of spoils you. It's small, but the people who go there are cool, the music is awesome, and the DJ is the best ever! Anyway... back to my little story. So we went tonight, and usually we don't go on Thursdays because of class and homework and what not. But it turns out that Thursdays are techno, which is cool, and something different than what we're used to. Usually we go on Friday nights, which is international music night, and they play a lot of Desi, Latin, etc. Techno night is the shizzle, there are way less people, and the ones that are there don't really dance. So it's just 4 of us (me, Heidi, Dita and Ash) out there dancing, and some random chick who was there comes up to us as she's leaving, gives us all a smack on the ass and a hug and proceeds to tell us that we rock. It was really random, but kinda cool at the same time. It's not everyday that some random chick you've never met before walks up, smacks your ass and tells you you rock. Later, we finally got some of the other people there to dance too, and we were having fun, and we look over at one of the couches and there's soft core porn going on right there in the club. The were making out, and this guys hands were going everywhere, on her boobs, on her crotch... it was grotesque... talk about PDA gone awry. Though, I must admit, it was good for a laugh. Overall techno night was a total blast. We need to make a habit of going every (or almost every) Thursday and Friday night!
In other news... WE BEAT THE HAWKS!!! I never thought we could do it, but they came out totally flat, we took out their QB and kicked their sorry asses all the way back to Iowa City. PWN3D! It's good to be a Cyclone. Needless to say, when basketball season comes around, they'd better bring it, 'cause they're coming to the big house, and if they don't we're going to wipe Hilton with them. I almost feel sorry for Adam Haluska, it's his big homecoming. I hope he's gotten some balls since he left... he's gonna need them.
There was other stuff I was going to pontificate about, but it's currently almost 3AM and I'm no longer thinking very clearly. So there will be more later when I remember what it is I wanted to write about. I know I said this last time too... but this time I really mean it. Promise. *hearts*
PS: A free show, good music, good friends, and a slap on the ass... gotta say, makes for a pretty good/interesting night.
PPS: I totally forgot to mention the transvestite in the red pleather with the 5 o'clock shadow. Maybe she'll come next week and we can get her to dance w/ us.
So, I've got a little bit of insomnia going on, mostly due to the fact that my mind is going about a million miles an hour. It's mostly the whole grad school vs. real job thing. I have no idea what I want to do and career fair is in a week and a half, and I haven't signed up or even started studying for the gre's. I also haven't updated my resume, which I really need to get on, because I've had a couple people offer to give it to people they know. Mostly it boils down to I have no idea what I really want to do. Unlike I had hoped, the internship didn't really get me any closer to that point. If anything it may have set me back a bit... then again it did kind of show me what I don't want to be doing. Unfortunately IT and IT consulting is a lot of the market right now. I'm still just so scattered all over the place and haven't found that one thing (or even 2 things) that I'm good at and love. So along with the mountain of homework/work I have I need to start figuring out the rest of my life in the next few weeks. Not my whole life... just the next few years of it, which right now seems like a lot. It'd probably help if I had time to find me again.
There was other stuff I wanted to write about, but I'm no longer forming cohesive thoughts... so more later.
Yay for coffee! A new study shows that coffee is full of antioxidants that help fight cancer and heart disease. This totally validates my addiction. So now not only does it allow me to function in the morning and throughout the rest of the day, but it's protecting me from cancer and heart disease among other things trying to kill me :). Now, I know, I can't get buy just drinking coffee, I still need fruits and veggies and whatnot. But it's still pretty cool. YAY FOR COFFEE!! (ok, maybe I've had a cup or two too many already today)
Haha, in other news, it's just as I predicted. I've been back in Iowa about a month and I'm already itching to get out again. Ironic, isn't it? A month and a half ago I couldn't wait to get back, and I'm already ready to leave again. I don't make any sense. I think part of it's the whole school thing. I've been in class a week and I'm ready for the semester to be over. Physics 2 is the death! Plus that and everything else... I'm not going to get my soul back until mid December.... if then. And I seriously need to get my act together if I'm going to take the GRE's and apply for grad school. That and attempt to keep my grades up or I'm never going to get in. I'm insane for even considering grad school... what's wrong with me? Maybe I just need to get out for a few days or a weekend or something. I just don't know where I'd go or what I'd do.
And for my little random bit of the day check this out. It's totally funny, totally stupid, and absolutely hilarious.
