live-journal is so last year

twitter is where its at now

I'm having a lot of fun with this CD cover meme.
The rules can be found here: http://www.flickr.com/groups/cdcovermeme/

Interesting Creative Commons photo + Random Wikipedia Page + Random Quotation + graphic design = instant CD cover

Very fun.

It's another ask five questions meme! Only this time, you have to comment with
something random - non-sequetors, song lyrics, whatever stricks your fancy -
and I'll ask you five questions. Post. Rinse. Repeat.

1. When are you gonna come visit me?
When 3 (maybe 4) factors are in place, then I will visit.
i. If I have a decent car.
ii. If I have money to pay for the trip.
iii. If we are still talking and friends.
(iv. If you come visit me first. :P)

2. What would you do if you had a million dollars?
I would pay off my school loans (because I have a lot of them) and I would invest the rest. Maybe I would get a car too.

3. Did you or anyone else you were with get kanchoed in Japan?
Nope. I think there may have been an instance on a show we were watching (cartoon type show). I there were only a few hard core Japan fans that would have known what that was previously anyway.

4. Do you currently have a tan or are you the usual pasty white color?
I have a very very slight tan that has almost faded back to pasty white. One bad burn a summer is enough to not put my skin through any more trauma.

5. Out of every piece of art you've made, what is your favorite?
None. I'm too critical to barely even like my art much less have a favorite. But there is a set of 6 nested bowls I made that I sort of like and an interesting painting of "east meets west" that I did with the subjects of Hello Kitty next to a hot dog that I'm almost fond of.

I noticed some bugs doing some interesting things the other day as I walked down our very long driveway to the mailbox. First, I saw a butterfly orgy. Five butterflies were all flying around together. Then as I walked back up the driveway, I found some grasshoppers having a threesome. I scared the third one off though and it was very amusing to watch the remaining two trying to jump in unison.

Yesterday was a pretty fun day. My parents are looking for some new furniture to add to the new house, so we went to Colders. Turned out to be a bust, my mom didn't see anything she really liked. I however saw some pretty nice futons that I wouldn't have minded having in my dorm room or future apartment. Since we had driven over an hour just to go to the furniture place, we decided to make an outing of it and go to the nearby town of Cedarburg. It's a really quaint historical type of town with lots of shops and restaurants. Being a Sunday however, a lot of the places were closed early and some were going to be closing soon. We had a good time though. I looked at a nice pottery shop and saw yet again a new kind of handle that I'm going to have to try this fall once I get back to school. Hmm...I should also try to make chip and dip sets or some of those cool bowls with a place to stick your chopsticks in. I even saw a glaze combination that looked pretty much exactly like the combination I used for my mugs for my final exam. Cool! So I really liked that. My mom and I also browsed through a nice shop that had a painting we liked (since we're looking for one to hang over the mantle) and lots of cute clothes. I think I need to start breaking out of my standard t-shirt and jeans combo and move on to some other stuff. I'm sort of trying....sort of. Also went to the shop we used to love as kids that had lots of little toys and a lot of candy too. That was nostalgic. Also saw some cute (and cheap!) earings. Maybe I should have gotten some, but I'm tying to be frugal right now. I'm realizing that frivolous purchases, even now, are going to hurt later on since I'm graduating this year and am going to need all the money I can get. It doesn't help that I don't know what I'm doing after school. I'm still entertaining the idea of grad school, which would be nice to stay on my parents insurance and because, well, I just really want to do more ceramics, but that also means racking up more loans that I don't have to pay for. Oh the woes of an art student. If I would have stuck with engineering, maybe grad school would have been basically free like it is for Ben, but that probably wouldn't have happened either. Nor do I think I would have enjoyed any of it either. No matter what I say I don't like about St. Olaf, I'm still really glad I transfered. I don't think MTU was really a good place for me.
Ah, but only a month of summer relaxing left. *sniff* The first month and a half of summer was hard though. I still can't believe I did 3 full classes in 6 weeks. It was a lot of work, but I think I'll be able to concentrate so much more this next year. I won't have extra GE credits to take my attention away what I really need to focus on...since I have a senior project each sememster for each major. Eek! I don't really know what I'm going to do for each project. Certainly have no ideas for my art project yet except for my medium. And the only idea I have for my Asian studies project is that I want to study asian ceramics in some way, but I don't know any specifics, if I want to focus on Japanese or Chinese ceramics, or what time period, or if I want to look at ceramics from another country/culture. I should probably stick with Japan since I'm learning Japanese, even though I feel I know much more about Chinese ceramics. After learning what I have learned in my Chinese and Japanese art classes, I feel that its not really that hard to learn any of this stuff, you just need an interest in it, but maybe it's just becaue the prof knew so much... I don't know.
Oh! Moving on to the picture which was the reason behind this whole post. Just proving to the non-believers that in Wisconsin, for a long time ATMs were called tyme machines (sounds just like time machine, making it confusing for anyone thats well....not from Wisconsin...reminds me of Dogma...Wisconsin is just this alternate sort of reality). This sign is advertising that there is a tyme machine (ATM) probably in that building. I haven't seen anything like that in a while, because I think tyme doesn't really exist much anymore, I think it's called Pulse now...but no one calls it that. My parents definitely did call them tyme machines though, and I thought nothing of it and probably made a fairly smooth transition into saying ATM, though I'm sure at least once someone has heard me call it a tyme machine. See, I was too young to have really used an ATM once I was going into college so I don't think it ever really stuck with me...now bubbler on the other hand. I don't know that I'll ever be broken of that. In the back of my mind, I think I'll always think bubbler and say drinking fountain just for the sake of those who don't know what a bubbler is. Weirdos. :P j/k

I was leaning over in the library and all of a sudden I had this really sharp pain in the back of my thigh...now it's kind of a dull pain. I wonder if I tore a muscle...darn that weight training...

At least I got started on research now. I have a stack of books that I can start going through. And for my other project I get to watch a Nazi propoganda film, "Triumph of the Will." Between the two projects I have, there are 3 other films I want to watch...but they're all on VHS...I know a friend who has a VCR, but I don't think he has it here. I might be subjected to spending lots of time in the library watching these now (one is 3 hours long...)

Didn't actually do much in weight training today, besides 'sprint training,' which thank god it wasn't actually sprinting. It still hurt and was very exhausting, but not as bad as the dumbell matrix was.

I can hardly believe that I'm almost halfway through my summer classes now. I have a lot of work for the second half, but at least I know it's do-able and that it won't be too much longer until I'm finished. That means I can have a much easier year next year to concentrate on my senior projects (yes plural)

So I haven't written in this blog since January. Will I keep it up? Maybe I will, maybe I won't. We'll see... I still wish I had my own domain name and could do my own blog, but I don't know if I really have the skills to implement that.

So an update of what I'm up to:
Doing Session 1 summer school at St. Olaf...will be here until July 13
Taking 3 classes (Weight Training, Women in America, and Theater in Society (ethics))
Sleep deprived (weight training starts at 6:45 am and I'm usually up late working because I've procrastinated on homework or taken a long afternoon nap because I couldn't stay awake)

So there's not too much stuff going on with me. Everyday is basically class, homework, sleep, repeat.
In that case, maybe I'll just post interesting links I have found throughout the day.

Steve Jobs in a Box

How to make glowing printer ink

Pint Stacking

I'm off to China and Japan for a month!

Dear Santa... Dear Santa, This year I've been busy! Last Tuesday I pushed techieb0y in the mud (-17 points). Last Saturday I gave mjsenkow a kidney (1000 points). Last Friday I helped applicite see the light (8 points). Last Thursday I pulled spi516's hair (-5 points). In June on a flight to LA, I stole the emergency flight information card (-40 points). Overall, I've been nice (946 points). For Christmas I deserve a Nintendo Wii! Sincerely, rachel8604

Write your letter to Santa! Enter your LJ username:

WIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

yeah, so i updated, but not really

-out-

i don't like blogging
i don't think i'm going to do it anymore
that and i don't have time, nor is my life that interesting

Holy shit it's snowing out here. Just tiny little flurry flakes...but it still is snowing. Heh, now it's getting heavier though. Has MTU even gotten snow yet?

Summer is winding down and I haven't posted in quite awhile. I'm looking forward for school because that means that I get to see more people again, even though when I think about it, I don't seem to have too many friends here. I'm also not looking forward to school because that means that summer is done and though I don't have a job from 7:30 am to 4:30 every day, I have classes and I'll have homework all the time. I'm starting to think that the job is better.
A sad thing happened at work the day I got my MacBook. The higher-ups decided that no one could use their personal computers at work anymore. This past week my boss outlawed file sharing and using VNC. So...whatever. It's pretty lame because I've done nothing wrong but I'm still treated like I can't be trusted, but whatever, they've got their heads to far up their asses to see that anyway.
The big news around Northfield today is the devastating hailstorm we had yesterday. We were pelted by 3 in + hail for about 15 minutes yesterday. Basically all of the cars in the parking lots around campus are ruined. The norm was to have the front windshield smashed, the back windshield completely gone, numerous large dents all over the car, and glass everywhere in the car, especially little tiny shards from the front windshield. This happened to Ben's car as well. You can see pictures here: http://www.magicite.org/hailstorm/hailstorm.html The hail was actually much bigger than you can see on the pictures. It was so large that some of it was still on the ground 5 hours later.
While helping him tape plastic over his windows, I managed to get a nice long cut down the palm of my hand. Luckily it wasn't too deep and barely bled. Just kind of like a really long, bad papercut.
So since his car is out of commission for awhile, his stepdad has to drive us to get our passports today. I'm hoping we won't have to have those damn RFID tags in them. If we do, oh well. There's nothing I can do about it. I printed off my Chinese Visa Application yesterday. It's strange to see it all in Chinese and English. I still can't believe I'm going to be going. I just hope Korea won't fuck anything up. I really need to get better at my Japanese and learn a bit of Chinese before I go though. Basically all of my Japanese speaking skills have deteriorated to none over the summer.

That's about all that's new here though. No one is at work right now except for me and I'm bored out of my mind. There is absolutely nothing to do and I've still got 2 hours left to go. I hope I can figure something out...I feel like I've exhausted the internet.

Finally! I have my MacBook! And it is shiny, and new, and gorgeous. And I can arm it with the remote like a car alarm. lol (It's not included, but you can get the software off of macupdate...it's called iAlertU. It's very cool and I think I'll have to donate money towards it. That will make sure no one fucks with my laptop though. Hehehe. But I'm completely in love, I never want to let it out of my sight. And I haven't even starting playing with the fun iLife stuff too much yet. I'm going to have to take lots of pictures once I get my new camera. Comic Life is very intriguing to me, it could definitely be a very cool application. I just don't know what to do with it right now because I want to do everything at once, but can't!
So, some obvious things about it that are different from my old laptop that I'll miss: big screen and good sound. You can't have it all though. I've also noticed that it won't pick up wireless signals as well. But all in all, I think I'm going to like this a lot more.
I just still can't believe that it's mine! I'm so used to being on Ben's Macs or the ones at work that I can't get used to the idea that this is mine and I can use it however I want to. I guess I earned it though.

But ooooo. It's time for dinner. General Tso's chicken. Itadakimasu!

YES! It's GONE! FOREVER! ...it had better be at least... I posted it to an email list here at Olaf where people can buy and sell stuff. So I sent out an email last night and had gotten a reply already on it then and by now (5:30 the next day) it's been sold and I'm rid of it. So of course the guy commented on how thick it was, but he needed one ASAP.
My shield zone stuff is completely adhered to my new iPod nano and my Macbook should be coming within the next few days! A resounding w00t. I'm so happy, even though it's been hotter than hell here for the past few days and I've been feeling kind of crappy. But, I don't feel like typing anymore right now since I've been running all over campus in the heat and I'm really damned tired.

It seems like it's been forever since I last posted, but it's really only been like 2 weeks. My class went well, I got a B+. I really would have liked to do better, but I was trying my best and I had a lot on my plate. I haven't done too much with the free time I now have though. I learned a little bit of HTML, but was too lazy to keep learning. heh. I'll pick it up again once I have a computer to do it on. My Dell isn't sold yet, but it's getting close. However, now the deal has been sealed. It has to be sold now. Why you might ask? Oh, just maybe because my Macbook should be getting here by the 3rd and my nano arrived TODAY! I'm uber happy. I just can't really play with the nano yet because the protector that I've gotten for it (shield zone, thanks Timmy!) is going to be getting here tomorrow. Then that takes at least 24 hours for it to cure/adhere. I can't wait to get the Macbook though! It's going to be awesome. I've been trying to find a good case for it too. I like BOOQ. Ben has one of their vyper sleeves, but I want something that can be a bag AND go inside of another bag.
...I'm so demanding :P
They have something that would work, but it's a little big for the Macbook, so I may get a cheap sleeve to go inside to give it a snugger fit. Heh, and then for another 50 bucks I could get it a shield zone protector too. Am I babying my yet to arrive laptop too much? Nah, it's worth it.
I should get rid of the Dell soon though. I'm still trying to make sound things work. I ordered the part from Dell yesterday and it should get here on or before the 1st. Then I'll put it up on St. Olaf extra and then ebay. It's such a long story with this part, but I'll make it quick.
So I plug in my headphones one day. No sound from the headphones, it's still playing through the speakers. Headphones are fine, it's something to do with the port or electronics. Headphones jack is attached to fan. Bid on inexpensive used fan on ebay which was guranteed to work. Get it, electronics for headphones work, fan is total shit. Go through long ordeal with seller, eventually get full refund and get to keep the part. Salvage electronics from ebay part and fan from old part. Headphones work, fan works, sound will not play out of speakers. Fuck. So I ended up with one electronic part that will play through the speakers and one that will play through the headphones. I say fuck it and get a new one from Dell and say it better damn well work. If it doesn't, I'm going to say fuck it and sell it as is, the buyer can deal with it if they want the computer.

I don't know if I ever updated about moving. I think I must have... My parents seem to have found a builder though and are making good time at figuring stuff out. I'm really proud of them for not waiting on it.

Work is work. We've had a lot to do lately. This is the first chance I've really gotten to breathe once in a day. It's good though. I'm learning a lot that will be good stuff to know. I'm now the one who can be counted on for Adobe Illustrator in the MDC. I've also gotten over my fear of Dreamweaver. I did a whole site for my Arts of Japan class this last semester and I've really gotten the hang of it. I'll post a link once it gets online.

Also as I promised before I'm going to switch my screenames and journal over to NihonGoose. This is just a warning. I'll make a final post when I acutally do it and anyone can add me to their friends if they still want to read my journal. The next thing I should get though is a domain name and sever hosting for it so I can acutally have my own website. But that can be for later. Heh, I guess it would also be good when I got to China and Japan. I'll probably be bringing my laptop along so I'll be able to update and upload pictures.

Oh! Shit, I nearly forgot. Saturday is my birthday. I can't believe I'm going to be 20...it sounds so old. I can't be a teenager anymore! ...not that that's a bad thing... :P

I'm finally done with my class. Now my nights are free to fun instead of homework. Thank god today is a friday too. My boss didn't come to work so I really don't have anything to do. She did give me something to work on, but I'm having trouble with the new live trace feature in illustrator. (I know what you're thinking, "It's so easy! how could she screw it up?!" It becomes more difficult if you are tracing multiple things and you need the space around them to be transparent.) So yeah, objects need to be layered, I previously cut all the backgrounds out in photoshop, I place them in illustrator to be traced, I trace and expand and boom, it gives the objects an opaque white box around them for some reason. Here's the kicked, I had done it on tuesday and it had worked right, buuuuuut somehow my work didn't get saved and now I have no idea how I did it. So yeah, I'll have to go back to Todd for another tutorial, hopefully he know's what's going on. Man am I pathetic.

I still can't believe my class is over. It hasn't really sunk in yet. It's going to be good to get a break. If my class is over, that means that summer is halfway over and I STILL HAVEN'T SOLD MY LAPTOP. Why? Well, for one I haven't had the time at all to fix the headphone jack or to clean it up and get it put onto ebay. Two, if my computer isn't sold, that means that I don't have enough money to buy the new one yet. Three, I had to take a bunch of days off for my paper and exam so my next paycheck is going to be taking a major hit, just as my last one did for some reason....now that I think about it, that one was waaaay lower than it should have been, I have to check that out later. But anyway, I can't wait to get a Macbook, I'm so sick and tired of the boat anchor and windows. I need expose and dashboard damnit!

Had my first homework free night last night. It was glorious. I played animal crossing for a long time. Then Ben, Todd, and I watched Orgazmo (it was so hilarious). After that it was late enough that the kitchen was open so we could make dinnner. Some guy was still hogging the sink and taking forever with his dishes so our macaroni ended up being a little over cooked. After cleaning up for dinner, Ben and I went and played some frisbee in front of Thorson. Got boring after a little while so I suggested we take a little walk. We went over to Mellby lawn and were going to play more over there when it started raining a little bit (which we kind of knew was going to happen, but we thought the storm was going to miss us). We decided to head back and stopped at the overpasses between Boe and Buntrock since it was starting to rain harder. I really didn't mind waiting around for the rain to let up, the grass needs it so bad. I'd say 70% or more of it was completely brown, it looked awful. Before a little shower earlier in the week, we hadn't gotten rain for about 15 days. I think we ended up getting a fair amount of rain, but it was a pretty gentle storm. There hasn't been a really good thunderstorm since I came here last fall. The thunder was extremely loud during those and the cross on the chapel actually got hit by lightning (it's made from stone or concrete so unfortunately there will be no reenactments of The Omen)

I go get donuts. Yay! :D

Mmmm...donuts. Interesting thing while getting donuts. Construction of the steam tunnel for the new science center is going on over by Holland hall. It was awsome to watch the digger scooping out everything and looking like it was going to digg itself into the hole. Maybe I'll go back and watch a little bit once I'm done with work at 12.

(Click here to post your own answers for this meme.)

✓ I miss somebody right now.  (Silly Ben, still at work.)	✓ I don't watch much TV these days.	× I own lots of books.
✓ I wear glasses or contact lenses.	✓ I love to play video games.	× I've tried marijuana.
× I've watched porn movies.  (Unless you count drunk girl at a party...lol)	× I have been the psycho-ex in a past relationship.	✓ I believe honesty is usually the best policy.  (USUALLY)
✓ I curse sometimes.  (Sometimes too much so and too loudly in public places where I shouldn't.)	✓ I have changed a lot mentally over the last year.	✓ I carry my knife/razor everywhere with me.  (It's just a teeny little pocket knife, nothing to be afraid of >:P)

( it goes on... )

Yesterday I found out the fact behind that myth of "goose eggs." You know when a cartoon character gets hit on the head they get a giant bump that instantly grows out of their head? Well its true, I just found it out with shins, not heads. So remember kids, always be careful when playing frisbee, because those things can be darn vicious when they hit you in the shin. I think it must be it hitting the blood vessle just right because within 30 seconds there was this huge bump on my leg. Quite painful. I'm not going to play frisbee for awhile now.

Thank god I'm the only one at work now. My boss wanted us to make video tutorials for some of the equipment we have and I am strongly against being on camera. Especially since she would be putting them on St. Olaf's local access channel, not that anyone is going to watch it, I just don't want them to have to opportunity to watch me making an ass out of myself. But since no one else is here, I couldn't possibly run the video camera by myself. ;P I guess that just means it's time to do more research for my paper. I have the horrible feeling of dread that says this paper is going to be a bitch to write. That reminds me that I have to email my prof for my class second session. I want to figure out the homework load because I definitely cannot do this again. I'm so burned out.

I've found out that I have quite a talent for making ethernet cables. Apparently it's a "marketable skill" according to one of the CS profs.

I'm about 50 feet from lake superior right now, sitting on my bed. Awesome! I'm at Ben's parent's cabin in Lutsen Minnesota. We drove up friday night, it's about a 5 hour drive...maybe more. The drive was pretty cool. Went through Duluth and some fun tunnels. We saw about 5 deer along the way, oh, and get this, a MOOSE! It was just standing in the middle of the road before it loped off to the side. It was enormous, I felt like we could have driven the car underneath it. It didn't have antlers so it was a female. Ok, well...I should probably get going because we have a lot we want to do today, but I'll add more later.