Wednesday, October 29, 2003

Follow-ups:

The CS Midterm was pretty easy. One problem was really hard (translating a sentence into logical quantifiers), but the two proofs were actually pretty easy (compared to the two on last years' midterm, given to us as a practice test).

I played a bit of Diablo II yesterday. I also discovered that all my characters were not deleted a month ago as I had previously thought. I also discovered that I really don't feel like playing that game that much any more. Oh well... maybe some of my friends starting from scratch can use some of the equipment in my stashes...

I've gotten to like a few of the Barenadies Ladies songs. The album still sounds like pop-rock, though.

The season premiere of 24 left much to be desired. I am not nearly as captivated as I was after the first or second season premieres. A dumb thing this season is that both main characters, Agent Jack Bauer and President Palmer, are sufferring from health conditions. Jack's recoving from a heroin addiction he acquired working undercover to nab a drug lord; Palmer's recovering from a bioterror assassination attempt that occured three years ago (in the last minute of season two). Jack was already rolling around in pain for the last episodes of season two; now I get to see an entire new season of it? Please.

And finally, the thing that's leading me to full-fledged paranoia. I got my first target last night. I haven't made progress towards my second target yet. I'm keeping a low profile because if I can avoid being shot until midnight, then at 8 am tomorrow my assassin will have failed to kill anyone in 48 hours and will be SCHEDULED FOR TERMINATION. (We tried to get the Governor-Elect to join our game but he's busy reading briefs about some fires in So Cal.)

The interesting thing is that my hunter is my roommate's target. Which means that if my hunter is killed (by a terminator or by my roommate), then I become my roommate's target. Ooh, this will be interesting.

New Topic
I'm beginning to plan my Thanksgiving weekend. I'm flying out on Wednesday, eating at a restaurant with my parents Thursday afternoon, and then... having a hell of a time seeing friends and family. Seeing all my UMD friends is easy, but of course this is the one time when they won't all be at UMD for convenient visiting. Maybe someone will throw an MBHS party; that'd be cool.

Homesickness coming on... I better go.



Tuesday, October 28, 2003

What's News in Jeremy's Life

I have a CS 103A midterm tonight. It should be lower-stress than the average midterm; I'm pretty good at logic.

The Diablo II patch 1.10 came out today, just narrowly outracing the collision of the North American and Asian tectonic plates. They were working on that thing for a long time.

I got Everything for Everyone, Barenaked Ladies' new CD. As my dad put it, it sounds like they switched their folk-rock for pop-rock. Some of the songs on it are good, and I've only listened to it 2 or 3 times, but so far I think Stunt and Maroon were both better albums.

The 24 season premeire is tonight at 9. It comes on in 20 minutes on the east coast; just after my CS midterm on the west coast. The premeire once again will be ONE HOUR with NO COMMERCIAL INTERRUPTIONS. Go to the bathroom during the 5-minute Ford propaganda movie before the show.

Finally, I'm in a game of Assassins. About 25 people in Roble all have squirt guns and a target. Your goal is to "kill" your target. Then their target becomes your new target. People keep getting killed until only one is left, Highlander-style. (Also, if you don't kill your target in 48 hours, the terminators come after you with big super-soakers or something.) I haven't made any progress on my target yet. My roommate took out his first target already. Neither of us have seen our assassins... yet.

Hope your days are exciting as mine!



A minor w00t:

http://www.journalism.umd.edu/mspa/contests/indvlcontest03.html#Web

Web-News Writing
Third Place: Kevin Chang and Jeremy Hoffman
"Schools open late after new shooting"
Silver Chips Online, Montgomery Blair High School, Silver Spring, MD

I always thought that was my best work.

It's sad... winning things like this seem less valuable than before College Apps...



Sunday, October 26, 2003

I felt much better Friday and was fully recovered in time for the Magic tournament. I'd guess that I had food poisoning, not a flu.

I went 4-4 at the tournament. I guess that shows that I'm at least a contender for tournaments like this. My deck did not perform as well as I'd hoped, however. (I lost to Goblins twice, for example; I thought my matchup against Goblins was better than that.) If I had tons of free time, I would playtest more and I could improve my deck's performance against the field... but since I do have a life, I'll just be forgetting about Magic for a while.

Out of the five of us from Stanford, only one finished high enough to win prizes. John Hegeman and his Elf deck went 6-2. His opponents could not believe when they lost to him. He was killing Goblins with his secret tech: Viridian Longbow. (This is very amusing to people who play Magic actively.)

After returning from the tournament, I got dinner at the Treehouse (burritos, mmm...). Then I just hung out with some people, played poker (losing $4, the most I've ever bought in for in one sitting), and then watched the movie Snatch in the lounge.

<strong>Snatch is an awesome movie.</strong> It's violent, fast-paced, impossible to follow, and really funny. Not recommended for all audiences :-).

Anyway, I've got some work piled up: 3 problem sets, 1 paper revision, and 1 short dumb lab write-up. Some people are watching The Matrix tonight and The Matrix Reloaded next Sunday in prepareation for The Matrix Revolutions the following week.



Thursday, October 23, 2003

I just realized...

Last week's blog post:
"Oh, for it to be this Thursday..."

Here it is, Thursday, and I'm ill, depressed, and frantic about stuff coming up in the next two days.

Fate, it seems, it not without a sense of irony...

(A cookie to the person who can ID the quote. Using a search engine would be considered a violation of the Stanford Honor Code, and probably whatever externally-enforced scruples you people have at other institutions.)



I've been neglecting my blog. Kevin Chang keeps up with his so well... but he's been in the habit of it for longer.

I think I've got a flu. I went through half a box of tissues immediately after waking up this morning, but I thought I was just having a bad allergy morning. (I'll get you someday, pollen...)

Then I ate breakfast, went to my IHUM section, felt really spaced out, went back to my dorm, tried to rest unsucessfully, and then my body helpfully got rid of that nasty breakfast food that apparently wasn't making me feel well.

At least then I could lie down okay. So I did. Slept like a total of six hours between noon and nine. (I've been getting about 6.5-7 hours of sleep, so it's not like I have any healthy reason to crash so much.) Hopefully I'll get an extension on my physics problem set due tomorrow... I missed section this afternoon, and I wasn't sure how to do all the problems, and I sorta needed this afternoon and evening to work on it, and I could barely think straight for most of today.

Well, as long as I can't think very well, I think I'll work on revising my rhetorical analysis or my contextual analysis papers for PWR. Really, that requires no thinking at all :-).

Then Lisa Kim called me. Shamefully I have been neglecting my other fellow Blazer. Sorry Lisa, you should have been on the same floor of the same dorm as me, like Anita, or at least the same side of campus.

A major complication is this state Magic tournament a bunch of us are going to on Saturday. I'm really psyched because I've never done a big tournament before, and although my chances aren't good I've done my homework on the deck I'm bringing and I have a shot. Of course if I'm still braindead from a flu then I will do much worse.

As a preparation for the tournament, the other guys and I were going to get together tomorrow afternoon/evening to put together the final versions of our decks and play some more practice games. Hopefully I won't have to cancel the small friendly draft tournament I was planning...

My immediate roommate tells me he used to play Magic. He insists that there's no skill involved. Sigh...

He better watch out or he might just wake up feeling a bit light-headed and quesy tomorrow; we sleep in the same room ;-).



Sunday, October 19, 2003

I have two papers and two problem sets due in the next three days.

Fuck.

Plus, the submission deadline for the Chaparral is Wednesday.

Also, my gaming buddies (and about-to-be-buddies) and I are madly scrambling to prepare for the state Magic tournament this Saturday. People are trying to build decks with cards they don't have; massive buying, trading, and borrowing ensues.

The good news is X-Men 2 is playing at Flicks tonight. The bad news is that I'm going to spend 3 hours at Flicks instead of working.

The other good news is that I had a fun relaxing weekend. The other bad news is that I didn't get shit done in said weekend.

Oh, for it to be this Thursday...



Tuesday, October 14, 2003

I took my first midterm today (Physics 51). I think I did pretty well, although I couldn't quite remember how a compound microscope works.

My PWR instructor really liked my Rhetorical Analysis paper (except for my conclusion, which I admit sucked). I've got to start doing research for my Contextual Analysis soon... I think the draft is due next Wednesday or something.

I need to be funny so I get pieces in the Chaparral. Being funny usually feels really easy but writing funny is much harder.

In fact, if I can get any suggestions from the peanut gallery, what are some funny things you think the "Office Assistant" (the little paperclip/computer with legs who pops up when you're using Microsoft Word to offer advice) could say?

The track I'm currently following is ludicrous bits of help that the paperclip could offer, like "It looks like you're writing a break-up letter. Would you like to talk about it?" or "It looks like you're a four-year-old randomly mashing the keypad. Would you like to watch an episode of Sponge Bob Square Pants?"

My other potential piece fits into the theme of the next issue. Themes are sorta sectet, I think, so I won't talk about this one just yet ;-).



Wednesday, October 08, 2003

Expect this headline come the next California gubernatorial election:

Governator Prepares for T4: Return of the Democrats

Apropro of nothing (*cough*), what the hell is the matter with people, in this state and in general?



Kevin Fang took my quiz (Stanford acronyms):

kfang 910: ResEd - Reseidential Guy Named Ed
CoHo - Company for Promiscuous Girls
FroYo - Afros for you
FloMo - Flow (as in rap) more
FroSoCo - Frozen Sock Company
PHE - Pan Hellenic Evil
RCC - Real Crazy Club
AA - Not enough funds to afford the 3rd A
PAA - Pennsylvania bought that 3rd A from above
HPAC - Huge Pack of Adult Content
IHUM - Internation House of Uncooked Meat
PWR (pronounced "power") - Please Waste electRicity
SLE (pronounced "slee") - Stanford Loves the Eastside

I award you pi out of e^2 points.



Tuesday, October 07, 2003

lordtorgamus: you should have said something about whether I would like to obtain some type of circular, flat baked goods
JeremyHoffman03: no, you have to actually accomplish something to earn a rhetorical pastry [offer]

I love the expression "wanna cookie?" but it is so often misunderstood. To the uninitiated out there:
1) You offer someone a cookie when they act proud of some minute accomplishment.
2) If offerred a cookie, do not accept the offer. It has been done to death and is not funny. Instead, hang your head briefly to acknowledge that the cookie-offerer has 0wn0rd/tinged/[web lingo for score against] you. Then both of you can move on with your life.

Loosely translated, "wanna cookie?" means "what, were you expecting some kind of reward for [minute accomplishment]?"

Pop Quiz: Which of the following are "good" uses of "wanna cookie?"?

A: "I went back and put mouseover texts on all of the images on the site!"
B: "Great, wanna cookie?"

A: "Hey, someone dropped a nickel!" [picks up coin]
B: "Wanna cookie?"
A: "No thanks, I've already got a nickel."

A: "I'm taking nine classes this quarter."
B: "Well, gee... wanna cookie?"

A: "I just scored with a hot chick."
B: "Wanna cookie?"

Correct answers:
Yes, 3, False, and "tautological consequence"



I just realized that I haven't talked about what happened to my car on the day before I left Maryland. It's a funny story; I'll post it tomorrow if I remember to do so.

Also tomorrow: Jeremy does his 3rd and 4th loads of laundry. (Luckily, I received some clothes from home today, so I can last a bit longer ;-).)

Oh yea, I almost forgot: my restrung tennis raquet finally arrived. Watch out, Lisa! :-P

--I was about to say "I don't have any balls," but, um, yea... stupid idioms...



Apology to my Readers
I am too lazy to insert "target=_new" in all of my hyperlinks. Hopefully you aren't too lazy to hold "Shift" while clicking on them. (For those using Netscape, sorry, you'll have to right-click, then select "open in new window". For those using Netscape on Macs, extremely sorry, you'll have to hold Control, then click, then select "open in new window".)

Jeremy's Long Rant that Eventually Comes to a Somewhat Intelligent Point
Something that's really starting to irk me:

Every club or organization seeking to attract new members employs a rhetorical strategy that I will call the "college-students-are-horny-let's-capitalize-on-that" approach.

Example:

SEX. MONEY. POWER.
Okay, maybe two out of three.

Join the ASSU.


Another example: (this one made me laugh, at least)

Wanna get laid?

Chicks dig websites.

tech.stanford.edu


Example the third:

Come see our fall play, [some stupid artsy-sounding name].

Intrigue.

Comedy.

Sex.


Clunky Presentation of Jeremy's Somewhat Intelligent Point
C'mon, people, this is getting old, fast. And it's detrimental to our health, too. Yes, we are horny people. But you can't be "on" all the time. If you keep pushing the buttons, the buttons stop working.

Imagine that you watched hours and hours of porn every day. Pretty soon, you would have very little interest in seeing porn stars getting it on. Or, for a rated-G example, suppose you watched eight episodes of Seinfeld a day.

This point was actually made in the introduction to The Darwin Awards, a hilarious book. (The premise: real things that people have done to (thankfully) "remove themselves from the human gene pool" through acts of total stupidity that leave them sterile or dead or both.) The introduction warned the reader to only browse the book for a few pages at a time. Taken alone, a stupid act will seem hilarious; after reading 50 others, it's pretty ho-hum.

Breaking News on the California Recall
Turns out that people were already selling "Governator" T-Shirts.

Jeremy's Advice of the Day
Don't buy one.



Sunday, October 05, 2003

The Recall Election is in two days. 8-O

If Ahnold wins, I plan to officially refer to him as the Governator. I encourage everyone to do likewise.



The San Francisco scavenger hunt was... wow. Ask me about it if you want; I'm not committing anything to print here ;-).



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