thehowe_v7.1

Hrm, yes, thoughts. Well.

For one, I'm gradumatated. Again. Like, for real this time, as in "see you later Ann Arbor, I'm off to the real world to get a job and stuff" for real. It feels.... good? I don't really think it's sunk in yet.

Also, entertainment. Over the past few weeks I've discovered not one, not two, but three incredibly awesome webcomics that have been around basically forever but nobody ever bothered to tell me about: The Adventures of Dr. McNinja, The Order of the Stick, and Questionable Content. You should read them. All of them, all their archives, in one sitting. Like I did. Totally worth losing 12+ hours of your life.

And yes, I realize that "Gradumatated" is not the correct spelling. It is, however, 327% funnier. How do I know this? Science.

I need to get this off my chest right now. I was just watching a show, Eureka, on SciFi, where they had to restart a man's heart. So, they break out the defibrillator. Okay, first of all: this is supposed to be set in a town full of crazy super-geniuses with ultra-high-tech toys. The best they have is a defibrillator? Please. Secondly - and this is what really gets me - after two shocks, they stop defibrillating, and start performing CPR. And then his heart starts beating again.

Hollywood, listen up. I'm sick and tired of seeing you get this wrong:

1. CPR can't restart a person's heart! All it does is keep the blood flowing until someone can do something more effective. (Like, oh, I don't know, use a defibrillator! Idiots.)
2. If you're really doing CPR correctly, you should be breaking ribs. This wussy bounce up and down on the guy's chest crap doesn't cut it. You want to pretend CPR is more effective than it is, for dramatic license? Fine. At least have the decency to break some bones while you're at it.

I swear, if I see one more medical drama, or cop show, or anything, where CPR restarts a person's heart, I'm going to write a letter. That's right, you heard me! Don't think I'm bluffing!

Today at work I was putting together a presentation for a talk I'm giving tomorrow on the project I've been working on for the first half of my internship. Put simply, I added some functionality and a new user interface to an existing application.

Of course, that's not how my twisted brain thought about it. I started envisioning the code as the torso of a person, and the original interface as the head. In this analogy, my extensions would be like a cancerous mutant second head sprouting from the shoulder, with its tendrils extending down into the torso. It'd be all twisted and weird, and it'd always be drooling and chewing on the main head's hair. It'd have like five teeth and one eye would be bigger than the other.

I was this close to using the analogy.

One of my AIM friend's current away message:

here

It's a paradox! She's both away and here! Gaaah!

(head explodes)

...

As you can see, I find this amusing to no end. Clearly something is wrong with me.

Sometimes, when I'm bored or tired, one of the things I think about is how words would sound with different pluralizations. If they're good, sometimes I even try and work the incorrect pluralizationalities into conversation, just to see if the person(s) I'm talking to are paying attention.

Sometimes, if they're really good, the new pluralization suggests a different meaning entirely. For instance: paradoxen, an alternative pluralizationism of paradox, could refer to paradoxical oxen. For some reason, I find that idea rather amusing.

I noticed something today. All summer while I was in Seattle I was using my laptop for all my computing needs. Now that I'm back at school I've got my desktop set back up, and I'm starting to use it again. What I've discovered is that owning two computers is kind of like having two families that you keep hidden from each other. You go to open a file, but then realize "oh, it's on my other computer." And the laptop is newer than the desktop, so it's like on of the wives is younger and prettier than the other.

I have to say, the whole situation is just a little awkward.

So there's this hill down the road from the house I'm living in. It's about a 200 foot run at almost a 35° incline. Last week, we got a lot of snow. My housemate Eric got the good idea to go sledding. Let me just say this: if you're ever at Meijer and you see a large green plastic saucer sled manufactured by a company called esp, buy it. So anyways, we got some sleds and we went out to this hill, at about 11:30 at night. Kids had obviously been on the hill all day, so the snow was quite well packed, and somebody had built some pretty damn sturdy snow ramps near the bottom of the hill.

Picture this: you're shooting down this hill pretty damn fast, and you're getting close to the bottom. You avoided the first snow ramp about 2/3^rds of the way down, and you see the second one coming up, so you steer towards it. Then in an instant, you come to a realization: there's a drop right after the snow ramp. A three foot drop, at about 55° - if you hit that ramp, you'll get about 4 foot of air before you hit the ground. And, once you've hit the ground, you'll only have about 3 yards to stop before you hit the tree line.

So anyways, both Eric and I came to this realization as we were nearing the bottom on the green saucer sled of death (he didn't believe me the first time). Here's an idea of how fast we were going: I dug in my heels about 2 yards before I hit the 3 foot drop, and I still went over the edge. Eric dug in his heels at about the same spot, hit the snow ramp with one, and instead of stopping actually got flipped over.

It was totally awesome.

Have I ever mentioned my little friend that lives in my walls? I don't think I have. We think he's a raccoon. He doesn't really smell, but every so often he gets in a little fit or something, and I swear it sounds like he's trying to dig his way through the drywall. One of these days I'm going to wake up in bed with a wild raccoon.

It'll be the most action I've gotten in years.

Is it worrisome that, when I comment my code, I use the royal "we"?

Giggidy giggidy giggidy giggidy giggidy giggidy giggidy giggidy giggidy giggidy giggidy giggidy giggidy giggidy giggidy giggidy giggidy giggidy giggidy giggidy

I think I had too many girl scout cookies.

Giggidy giggidy giggidy giggidy giggidy giggidy giggidy giggidy giggidy giggidy giggidy giggidy giggidy giggidy giggidy giggidy giggidy giggidy giggidy giggidy giggidy giggidy giggidy giggidy giggidy giggidy