Still Adjusting to College Life... MIT Life... No Life

Mmmf. I've been so busy this week that I haven't had time to write at all. Had a chem test on Wednesday, evil evil math last night, you know how it goes... Got the chem test back today... Got a 65. Which sadly, wasn't such a bad grade - the average was a 61. So, hey, I'm above average for once. x_x This is so sad... Major scale-age, anyone? I am actually pretty happy with my score, which is sad. I figure, if I had known how to do titrations, I would have done REALLY well. Hrmph. We've been promised more titration problems on the final. I'd better get really good at doing those so that my mind doesn't go blank when I see a problem mixing acids and bases together.

Tonight I went to a chemistry forum - the purpose of it is to let the professors and students mingle a bit, and let the professors get some feedback. I was one of 3 students who showed up... such a small crowd! Professor Drennan was very nice though, and we talked about how to improve the class and stuff. It was pretty interesting. Plus, there was free food! I took a whole pizza back for Amy and David and me to munch on since there was so much left over. Better than leaving it for random grad students. :P It was amusing to walk back through the school, carrying the pizza box and looking like a delivery girl or something. Hehehe... It is fun to make people wonder...

Oh, so earlier today, I saw the coolest thing ever. Class was over, so I was heading back home, and as I was walking by a doorway, this guy rollerbladed in. He stopped himself on a nearby table, and yanked a lever thing on one rollerblade, and a bar with wheels attached came off. Same thing to the other foot, and off he walks in his tennis shoes, carrying his wheel attachments. Wow. So totally cool. I want a pair of attachable wheels to stick on my shoes and skate back and forth from class! Aaaagggghhhh! Sooooo cool! Of course, this being MIT, I suppose I shouldn't be too surprised... He probably made them himself. Still, I am very impressed. Better than dragging your rollerblades around everywhere. ^_^

Hnn.... Today is just full of good news... I also got my psychology paper #3 - it was a rewrite of #2. I got 10/10 on it!! I'm so happy! I didn't think the paper was awesome, but I was sure it was an improvement over the old one. I guess my TA thought so too. So yay! I'm so happy! Yeah! No more work to do tonight! A friend commissioned me to draw the Slyffindor quidditch team (a cross between Gryffindor and Slytherin) She's the seeker, and I'm in there somewhere... I guess I'm a chaser. Certainly not a beater. ^^; Aaah.... It's so nice that tonight has not been stressful at all. So, with that said, I'm going to go to bed right now and get more than 6 hours of sleep for once. ^___^

- Flykyr Skysong

Current song: Masami Okui - Cutie
Current mood: Happy happy happy!

The Joys of Being a Lowly Server...

This is shaping up to be a terrific weekend. I got to see Harry Potter last night (yeah!!!) and so I was all happy and thought today would be dull or something. And it was, mostly, since I was trying to do work as usual (and getting nothing done, as usual) when David and Amy invited me to go along and serve food at the BITSA banquet. BITSA is the Boston Intercollegiate Taiwanese Student Association and they had a conference today. We even hosted a visiting student in our room - she's really nice. So anyway, I guess Amy and David had somehow gotten recruited to serve food for all the people. And they needed more people, so I got sucked into the whole deal as well. It was a good thing though. ^_^ I ended up serving lots of Chinese food... Some people were rude, sheesh! But afterwards, we got leftovers for free! Woo hoo! Chinese food! Chopsticks! Oh yeah!!! Gaaaah, I have been so Chinese-food-deprived recently. This was great because I got dinner and a performance for free. Better than paying $8 for the same! So, uh huh, I am happy now. Time for homework!

- Flykyr Skysong

Current song: .hack//Liminality - Grandpa's Violin
Current mood: Full and happy

Harry Potter Strikes Again!

Yaaay! I saw Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets today! Yah, it was really good! Of course, the book was better, but that's always the case. Almost every boy's voice has changed in this movie... It's disconcerting. And goodness, they make the movie so dark! It's quite interesting. Still, I won't say any more because I'm sure other people want to see it for theirselves. It was good... but what I'm really waiting for is Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers. That movie's going to be awesome! A trailer was played for it before today's movie, and when it started, everyone in the theater started clapping. It was really funny. Ah! I can't wait!

I am coloring a picture of Tsukasa for my door right now. Geez, it's so annoying. All of his clothing is some shade of brown/gray and I can't get any of the shades right. It's very annoying. I've done better. Oh well, it's better than nothing. ^^ I wonder what I should draw next... Aargh, I want a scanner and a good color printer. I would so color everything on the computer. It looks so much more professional! Hahaha... I was so quickly converted to computer coloring by the copy of PhotoDeluxe that I installed on here. It does a good job. ^_^ Grr! No one has a scanner! It's so depressing. Guess I'm out of luck until I go home...

Today was a good day. Not only did I get to see Harry Potter, but Nate also dropped by... He and his friend Adam were in the area, I'm not sure why, so they decided to pay me a visit. It was really nice to see him again - especially since I haven't met up with anyone else here besides Jolanta so far! Huh... I miss all my friends. We're all scattered all over the place. It's sort of sad. Well, I might be able to do something with Julie this weekend... Not sure, since she's at an orchestra party right now. ^^ So this weekend's looking pretty good, even though I have to start studying for yet another chem test. Aargh! It never ends! Well, such is life here. ^_~

- Flykyr Skysong

Current song: Morning Musume - Say Yeah
Current mood: ^___^

Some People...

Ack! I'm not done with my math p-set yet, and it's due in just a few hours! :P Cycloids are very very evil. Stay far away from them if you know what's good for you. Oh well, at least I'm all caught up on Harry Potter (random, I know, but at least I know what the movie's going to be about!). Raar... I'll be up all night tomorrow (tonight - eek!) doing chem. Life is fun, isn't it? Anyway, here's an amusing conversation I overheard today on the way back to my dorm:

Guy1: So how's crew?
Guy2: Crew?
Guy1: Yeah, crew practice.
Guy2: Oh! 6:45 every day!
Guy1: 6:45?
Guy2: 6:45 in the morning.
Guy1: Wow. How do you deal with that?
Guy2: Three alarm clocks.

Hmm... Highlight of the day: Going to jiu jitsu and watching the instructor cause pain. And then trying to copy him and cause pain on other people. It's quite interesting really. Fun fun. Better than p-sets. Which I have to do now. X_x;

- Flykyr Skysong

Current song: Shinohara Tomoe - Chime
Current mood: I hate math!!!

Bed and Books

I am going to bed early tonight! Yes... Before 2 am! I'm so excited. :P *falls asleep at desk and topples over*

Well, enjoyed another long weekend by not doing too much. I dragged Amy and David along to the Cambridge Public Library. It's practically at Harvard - bit of a hike. Still, it's a very nice library. Surprisingly large inside and very old. It's interesting - there's four floors devoted to fiction and nonfiction. But I didn't hang out there too long - I was looking for Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (coming out this Friday and we got tickets!!!). So I hung out in the Sci-fi/Fantasy section. Wow, it is so much better than the library back at home! There's a really good selection, and they're rather up-to-date as well. The coolest thing was to see a graphic novel section... with ElfQuest! Wai! I haven't seen one of those books since, uh, 9th grade, I think. Too bad the earliest one I could find was book 6, since I have only read the first one (it was really well done). There's a lot of good books there. I forsee myself going back often... unless I find out that MIT has a good fantasy section somewhere. I haven't checked yet, but I probably should. 'Twould be a whole lot faster than walking to the Cambridge Library - it's about half an hour each way on foot. Oh well... That's an experiment that'll have to wait, since I'm going to sleep RIGHT NOW! Mwahahaha..... ^_^

- Flykyr Skysong

Current song: .hack//Liminality - Liminality
Current mood: Sleepy

Where Does all the Time Go?

*sighs* Weekends are great. But they always come to an end. And of course, they seem to pass by so much faster than the rest of the week. Ah, somehow I never seem to get any work done over these fleeting moments of freedom. Whenever I crack a book open, I soon turn away from it to do something else. It's horrible. Did I use to be like this? I don't really think so... Why can't I do work anymore?! It would be so incredible if I say, finished all my math homework so that I wouldn't have to do it the night before it's due? Well, I tried that today... didn't even come close. Where does all the time go to?

Hrmph. It all goes into drawing, I think. I haven't had enough time for it lately, so my creativity came to a head, and I have to let it all out. Hopefully, once it subsides, I can get some work done. ^_^ It's so sad not to have as much time to draw as I used to. It's so funny - i haven't even doodled for the first two months of school - all my notes are so clean. And then, all of a sudden, pictures start appearing. You can't keep a good doodler down! :P Of course, they are all of Tsukasa because his outfit rocks! So I have little Tsukasas drawn everywhere. I even drew a larger one for my door (finally!). Still have to color it though. No worries... it'll be done. Probably before I finish my math homework. ^^;

- Flykyr Skysong

Current song: Schiller - Dancing with Loneliness
Current mood: Wow... Look at all the homework I haven't done yet. Overwhelmed.

I Hate Email

Woohoo! I don't have an 'I hate MIT' rant today! Except I have a chem p-set due tomorrow that I haven't really started. But... if I don't think about that right now... I can happy!

Yeah, my math test went well today, I think. I know I screwed up big time on the first question because I accidentally used the wrong coordinates (Ack! So stupid of me!) But otherwise, I felt that I pretty much understood most of the material, which is a first. And I didn't get any fail mail, so I guess I must be safe! Unless they haven't graded mine yet... o_o; No, must not think negative thoughts!

Arrgh, so today I went to check my Hotmail account. Of course, all I get is junk mail, but I'm an overly optimistic person so I go look anyway. Well, lo and behold, all there was was junk mail. And one of those stupid announcement thingies that MSN sends out to everyone to try to get them to pay money (for rotten service, I'm sure). Because I was desperate, or stupid, whichever you prefer, I decided to actually read the announcement for once. And the first line was, "Like a cold, nothing spreads faster than a computer virus." Gaad, how lame. DUH!! Why do you think they call viruses viruses?! I don't really know why I am so peeved, but that sentence just strikes me as unbelieveably stupid. Sorry MSN, no money for you. Like you were going to get any from me anyway.

I never thought that my MIT email address would be so popular. Somehow, everybody sends me stuff that's meant for someone named Lisa Briggs. How awful! She doesn't sound like a student - she gets all these reports from people in labs and stuff. So... she must be new here or something. I mean, she has her own email addy, and if she isn't new, then she's probably had it for a while. So why does everyone send stuff to me - a freshman?! Haven't they figured out her email address already?! And if not, then it's really really easy to look up anyone's email addy on MITnet just by putting in their first and last name. Can't anyone spare two seconds to make sure they aren't sending suspiciously attached files to a random freshman? Does anyone think about how annoying it is to get random mail from random people? Heh, it'd be funny if it were confidential material. Maybe I should start collecting it... Darn, I knew I should have signed up for labrat@mit.edu. x_x

- Flykyr Skysong

Current song: Enigma - Traces (Light and Weight)
Current mood: Tsukasa, Tsukasa, Tsukasa! :P

We Love Cooking... But We Don't Love Physics Tests At All!

Nooo.... I don't understand physics at all. So bad. This time I really WILL fail my physics test. Aargh... *dies* Hahaha... Please excuse me as I rant yet again about how much my life sucks.

On a cheerier note (not really), I think that college students need four meals a day. I am not used to being up this late. I mean, I ate hours ago - at perhaps 6:30ish today... and looking at the clock, that was seven hours ago. A long long time. I need more food. Rather, I need to go to sleep earlier so that I don't get hungry at night. Or, I could just horde food in my room. ^^ Of course, it would be better if I actually had something other than cookies on my desk. This is not good...

Well, since I'm on the topic of food, I just remembered that I have to cook for friends on Friday. Now, unfortunately, the only thing I can cook is paella. Not that that's a bad thing, mind you, but it does somewhat limit me. Plus, I'm used to cooking up a lot, in a really really big pan. And do I have a big pan? Oh no, of course not. Hmm, this could present a problem, especially since I have no idea who's coming at this point in time. I'm hoping to be able to cut the amounts in half, and not create a week's worth of food at once. There's lots of ingredients in it... Just thinking of how much this is going to cost me in groceries is frightening. Great. That begs the question - once I buy the groceries, how am I going to get them home? Aaargh... This is starting to sound more and more dismal. Ha, watch no one come, and I'm stuck with all this food... Well, that's plenty of free meals right there. Hrm, I should probably make multiple trips to the store - buy a little bit each day. ^_^ Darn that ten minute walk to the grocery store!

Gaah... I wish it were this easy to type up psych papers. I'd be done in five minutes.

*gnashes teeth and glares at computer* "You can download .hack//SIGN episdoes faster than that, you stupid thing!" *beats the poor machine senseless* Ha, well that was fun. But the studybreak is over now. Back to work. NO! No more failure! Aargh. Having a math test on Thursday does not help my mood at all. x_x

Sweet dreams, kiddies.

- Flykyr Skysong

Current Song - .hack//SIGN - Where the Sky is High (Nyaar! Music of gorgeousness! That is a word. Yes. :P)
Current Mood - Hungry!

Flykyr's Brain is Tired


Need sleep... This psych paper is evil... as usual. I think I may be almost finished, which is nice, but it's still a page too short. x_x Grr. It's a problem for tomorrow! Or rather, later on today. Hmm... Someday I will go to sleep at midnight, just for fun. I wonder if it would even be possible... *ponders and becomes very sad*

So... news of the day... Math recitation was interesting. Last Friday, in math lecture, some students had written things about our prof on the blackboards that are hidden below the chalk tray (they slide back behind the wall and can be pulled up when needed). Our prof pulled up one of the boards while writing and it said 'Prof. Mattuck rules!' We were all very amused. It was even better though because the other two boards (there's three panels in the massive blackboard at the front of the lecture hall) had similar things written on them. It was a nice stress-reliever sort of thing to break up the lecture. Well, anyway, today, our math TA was late... as usual. His name is Jerry and he's always late because he teaches a class right before he comes and does recitation with us. Anyway, people decided to write stuff on the board for him to be amused by. Tim wrote a good one: "MATTUCK IS GOD. JERRY IS HIS PROPHET." The funny thing was that Jerry didn't notice for the first five or ten minutes of class even though it was smack dab in the center of the chalkboard. Jerry has tunnel vision or something... Well, it was funny, because he finally saw it and said, "Um, right." Then he left it up for a while. I wonder if he was flattered... Oh yeah, another funny/strange thing happened in today's recitation. There's all sorts of way to show that a letter represents a vector. Most commonly, you draw an arrow over the letter. Another way that's commonly used in textbooks is to put the letter in boldface type. Jerry's way of putting chalkboard letters into bold-face type is to make it look like a roman numeral - he puts lines on the top and the bottom of the letter. So he was using X today, and when he added the lines, he made it look like an hourglass. He'd never done that before - he usually uses the little arrows, but, I don't know. He was being weird today or something. Anyway, we asked him what it was, and he explained. When he finished, this kid calls out, "It looks like a chocolate chip cookie!" We stare at him for a second or two, and then all yell, "WHAT?!" after which he was suitably embarrassed and refused to reveal what had been going through his mind at that point in time. Ahahahaha... People are amusing.

My brain is melting down or something. Either that, or I just have bad nightvision, which is probably the more reasonable explanation, or at least I'd prefer to think so since the thought of melting brains is just plain gross. Eww... I'll stop talking about that right now. Anyway, I had an unpleasant reminder that I live in a city, and cities are quite... different from small towns, especially where vermin are concerned. So I was walking along to my gym class (jiu jitsu!) and I saw something moving under a bush. I got closer, and I was thinking, 'Geez, it's awfully late for a squirrel to be out at night.' I swear, this critter was nearly the size of the gray squirrels that hang out near MIT's sporadic oak trees. I got closer, and then started thinking, 'Wait... What happened to its tail? It's so small and not fluffy-looking at all.' Then, a step or two later, 'Oh my goodness. It's a rat?!' The rat stares at me with this 'Is she going to feed me or not' sort of expression on its face before fading into the underbrush. Aaah! Big brown rats right in the middle of campus! Right across from my dorm! Ew! One thing's for sure... we're not in Londonderry anymore, Flykyr. Yes, this IS a city. And I am painfully aware of that fact. So... yeah. What kind of squirrel would be out at night anyway?

A side note of squirrels: They are really stupid. These oak trees drop acorns like mad (and try to kill people, as I've mentioned before) and there are acorns EVERYWHERE! So where are the squirrels? Good question - they must have gone on vacation or something. So the other day these groundskeepers went and raked up all the leaves that get all over the place from the trees. And guess what else they rake up? Yep, you got it - acorns. So now there are no acorns on the ground. And, oh, smartness! Today, I see a forlorn squirrel wandering about on the ground and eagerly pouncing on the one acorn on the ground. This is so sad... Makes me think of myself actually. I'd be stupid enough to do something like that. Someone remind me why I'm at MIT again? :P

- Flykyr Skysong

Current song: Titiyo - Come Along
Current mood: Yaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaawn....

Hmph. Yet another unproductive weekend. And it's been so pretty too. I should go out and do something... Except I have to write my psychology paper! Aaaghhh! Why are psych papers always due right after a fabulous weekend? Figures.... -_-; Gaah, I hate research!

Hahaha... I didn't go to anime club this week (again). Turns out that I can have a much more enjoyable time watching my own stuff than what they dish out. *shrugs* Plus, they were having a cosplay contest this week in honor of Halloween. Now, cosplay just scares me... people aren't meant to go and look like their favorite anime characters. *shudders* Still, a small part of me is curious as to how it turned out... No no no, let's not go there.

So, on the topic of anime... Um, my computer is running out of space. Again. Maybe I should invest in a cd burner, or something. Or go home more often. ^^ Sheesh. It's amazing at how quickly those episodes pile up and eat up all my space... *growls and pulls out alternate harddrive again, sees that it's full, and angrily tosses it back in its drawer* Hmm... So what am I currently watching right now? *blinks* Well, I've been watching Record of Lodoss War. Too bad it's in English. Dubs are so awful. I guess this one isn't too bad, but English voice actors can never put in enough emotion. Utterly unconvincing. -_-; Heh, I find that I'm just watching it for Deedlit - pointy ears are fun, and hers are huge! I am vastly amused... she could probably put out someone's eye just by turning her head at the wrong time. Okay, well besides that, I've also started watching a bit of Rurouni Kenshin - very interesting, but Kenshin's voice disturbs me. Gaah, he almost sounds like a girl. And the fact that he wears pink doesn't help one bit. Nrr... He has fun hair. That gets me every time. Anime hair rules. ^^ So... I have many many Trigun episodes that I haven't watched yet, although I HAVE seen the whole series before, so that's not a top priority. I also have a lot of Cowboy Bebop eps as well. That's another western-space type anime - it has really good music. Hmm... I was keeping up on Excel Saga as well, but now I'm a bit behind on that as well... Need more time. :P And I still have Final Fantasy Unlimited episodes to get through - there isn't enough time to watch everything! FFU is disturbingly amusing. Well, what can you expect... it's made by the same people who have produced video game after video game, so I guess the really bizarre monsters are to be expected. The mixture of computer animation and cel animation is interesting, but not entirely convincing. Plus, I don't really like the animation style - it's too simple, and there's practically no shading. Not pretty enough for me. x_x Hahaha.... Looking back on this, I suppose I have no excuse to wonder why there's no space on my computer.

Well, okay. The real reason that I started talking about anime was so that I can talk about what I'm currently hooked on. ^^ So... yeah, .hack//SIGN is my new favorite anime. Aaah! It's soooo cool! Not only is it beautifully drawn, but there's computer animation mixed in with it, like FFU, only the makers did a much better job on it. I've been very impressed - the storyline is interesting, and the music is incredible. Plus, the main character rules. Tsukasa is a young sorcerer who is trapped in The World - an online roleplaying game (like EverQuest). And really weird things start going on, centering around him.... Hmm, it's very interesting. I like it a lot. Especially Tsukasa. :P Heh... he has the greatest outfit ever. I want it! And he's got gray hair!! Aagh... If you know about my dark elf appreciation, then you'd know that I really really like white/gray hair. ^^; Hehehe... Funness. Of course purple hair is good too... Strangely colored hair in general is lots of fun. Oh yes, oh yes. Hmm... I'm going to shut up now because I'm starting to sound like a raving lunatic. o_o;

- Flykyr Skysong

Quote of the day: If cleanliness is next to godliness then your desk must be an atheist.
Current Song: Ronan Hardiman - Angel
Current Mood: Stress is starting to set in...