Three till Seven

(00:04:33) Noir: so…
(00:04:42) Trinity: what?
(00:04:47) Noir: can i tell you about my ass?
(00:04:51) Noir: specifically, one section of it?
(00:04:57) Trinity: NEIN!

(00:05:15) Trinity: are you missing an ass chunk?
(00:05:17) Noir: since ich spreche nicht gut deutsch, i’ll take that as a “ja”! :D
(00:05:21) Noir: i AM, by god!
(00:05:24) Trinity: ARGHHH!
(00:05:28) Noir: well, it’s right under my ass…
(00:05:34) Noir: left side, under the cheek.
(00:05:38) Trinity: did you SHIT in your chiar?
(00:05:38) Noir: i knicked myself shaving!
(00:05:47) Trinity: SHAVING YOUR ASS?
(00:05:53) Noir: lol. no, i SHAVED in my chiar! if “chiar” is german for “shower”…
(00:05:54) Trinity: its officially dezember!
(00:06:02) Noir: rofl. not my ass, right UNDER my ass! my upper thigh!
(00:06:04) Trinity: arghhh!
(00:06:17) Noir: jeez, i’m not some kind of, like, ass shaver, trin.
(00:06:19) Trinity: OH! i thought you meant under your ass as in like teh chair is under your ass.
(00:06:29) Trinity: oh my god.. this needs blogged.
(00:06:32) Noir: lol. yes, i shaved my chair right under my ass!
(00:06:34) Noir: it will be!
(00:06:44) Trinity: gut! i need to show andrea, but i dont feel like blogging!
(00:06:51) Noir: so anyway, this ass chunk.
(00:06:57) Noir: :D
(00:07:09) Trinity: i dont care about your skanky ass chunk!
(00:07:19) Noir: i thought you put “skinny”. i was so about to correct you.
(00:07:21) Trinity: theres a german accent on tv!
(00:07:29) Noir: just the accent? no language?
(00:07:32) Trinity: FAT AS CHUNK!
(00:07:37) Noir: i’m as fat as chunk!
(00:07:39) Trinity: well, it sounded like an accent.
(00:07:49) Noir: no, it sounded like an ass-ent!
(00:08:03) Trinity: lol. that almost looks bent-trentisch!
(00:08:08) Noir: you did the isch!
(00:08:13) Trinity: ack!
(00:08:17) Noir: german hast dich!
(00:08:19) Trinity: no, i should have put trentich :D
(00:08:34) Noir: i hear athletes get trent itch really bad…
(00:08:44) Trinity: EWW! that is not der itch!
(00:08:48) Noir: der!
(00:09:02) Trinity: that was INTENTIONAL!
(00:09:13) Noir: that would look better as “INTERNATIONAL”!
(00:09:45) Trinity: oh my god… das Afterjucken = anal itch!
(00:10:03) Noir: ew, i need to know that. i’m going to go to Germany and that’s what i’ll say first!
(00:10:11) Trinity: der Afterjuckreiz and der Analpruritus are too!
(00:10:15) Noir: no “where is the bathroom” or “what is a good restaurant” for ME!
(00:10:16) Trinity: EWW!
(00:10:25) Trinity: it scares me that they have so many words for anal itch…
(00:10:32) Noir: lol. gotta have variety.
(00:10:36) Trinity: lol.

My favorite old Nikes finally bit the dust yesterday; I looked down at my sole to find that the entire bottom half of my right shoe was dangling by a single thread of rubber. When Jessica and I went out to Wal-mart to get wrapping supplies for gifts, we stopped by the mall and I bought some new, sexy, orange-and-white Nikes for $40.

Yesterday was okay except I was really tired and thus had a headache for a while. After eating I did feel better but the food must’ve been drugged because, while driving back from our excursion, Jessica and I couldn’t stop laughing. She told me I must blog about the whole thing, so here goes.

On the way to Wal-mart, there was a bicyclist riding beside us but he kept getting over in our way. We had to slow down to a crawl because we just couldn’t get around the guy. It wasn’t just that the road was narrow, it was that he kept coming over directly in front of us. The guy must’ve been suicidal or unobservant. I mean, here we are driving in one of four lanes of traffic and this guy is weaving in and out of the bike path and our lane. After several minutes, he finally turned into a parking lot. Crazy people out there.

On the way back from the mall, I was holding both of our Icee cups. I was going to put them in a shopping bag in the backseat but needed a hand free to get the bag, so I handed them both to Jessica since we were sitting in traffic. I noticed while handing them to her that the cars in front of us were moving again but it didn’t register with me. As soon as I handed them to her she had to hand them right back; “Oh yeah, you have to drive,” was my clever comment.

There was something else I was going to write up about yesterday but, alas, I can’t remember it now.

I feel I’m going to have a boring weekend but that it won’t be restful because I’ll be worrying about finals (not really my CS final, just my calculus one) and assignments that I have to work on:
- a group project for Spanish that involves writing an essay and giving an oral presentation (each person speaks for about five minutes) on this history of Puerto Rico; I have 1898-present
- program 5
- calculus homework
- a 6-9 page essay for honors
And then of course I have to study for calculus and CS 115.

I plan on buying Trinity’s Christmas gift this weekend as well as renting the film Man on Fire, which Steve keeps recommending to me. I told him I’d watch it on the condition that he watch Silence of the Lambs, one of my all-time favorite films/books.

I need to get the addresses of Michael, James, and probably my CS 115 TA, Naren, in order to send them Christmas cards. I emailed Michael for his yesterday so I’ll have to check and see if he’s replied.

And yay, he has!

We went over finding the volume of a rotated curve today in calculus which was pretty cool. We also took a quiz but I don’t know how I did on it. I’m thinking I got the second and third problems correct but not the first. I just dingled around on that one for a while, trying different things. When I tried doing it on my calculator, I got the answer to be -ln|cosx| which is something we haven’t covered yet. I scribbled that answer in but I doubt I’ll get any points for it. Maybe I’ll get a couple of points for my dingling, though; the TA is pretty generous like that. I did, however, get 20/20 on the quiz that was returned to me yesterday, hooray.

I don’t know how the Spanish test went. I think I did well on all the parts except for the one dealing with passive voice using “se” but maybe I’ll be surprised and get those right. I almost ran out of time (fifty minutes) so I rushed through the last two questions but I think I answered them correctly. I got a 93% on versión 1 of composición 4. Oh, and that’s another thing I’ll have to do: fix the mistakes in version 1 and turn in version 2.

We’re supposed to go over books three and four of The Aeneid by Virgil today in honors but our schedule is usually off. Who knows what we’ll actually cover. Hopefully it will be 3 and 4 because I’m quite prepared for those; I made out notes and everything. I ended up with a 93% on my last paper in there.

I started reading The Genesis Code by John Case last night and it has been quite interesting so far. Entertaining and suspenseful.

This is not a good weekend for my friends’ cars: Steve has a broken clutch cable and I just found out Jess has a flat tire. Her car is currently at the mall and she’s coming over here for me to take her there to check on her baby. This is fine by me because I’m tired of doing homework but I’m bored and can’t think of anything else to do. I have two loads of laundry in dryers right now but those won’t be done for another half hour so I can’t occupy myself with folding and putting away clothes. At least Trin is online so I have someone to talk to.

(16:11:31) Noir: i’m sick of Puerto Rico!
(16:11:41) Trinity: do germany’s history!
(16:11:57) Noir: i can’t! my group had to choose a spanish-speaking country.
(16:12:11) Trinity: tell them youre leaving the group and finding a better country!
(16:12:20) Noir: lol. that would be funny!
(16:12:35) Trinity: thats why you should do it!

Yesterday was fun. I went to a ballet with Jess and her family because Jess’s cousin was the lead female. I wasn’t familiar with the story of The Nutcracker but it was okay. Afterward, Jessica and I went to dinner at #1 China Buffet and I did an impulsive, daring thing and tried sushi for the first time. It was actually decent-tasting; I quite liked the one with cucumber in it.

Program 5 is quickly becoming the bane of my existance. I’ll be so glad when I get that thing finished. I tried taking Michael’s advice with it but that just gave me seg faults so I went back to tinkering on another version of it. I’m stuck on how to get the numbers of the words showing instead of the actual words. After banging away on it for a little over an hour, I sent my TA a quick email asking for help and took a break. That was this morning.

I have the dorm to myself today since Lora went shopping with her mom. This is quite nice; I can play my belovéd German rock as loud as I please! Well, louder than normal when I have to consider Lora, at least.

Note: This was a dream of mine. I have this warning here because some visitors have thought my life had just gone to pot, when really they were only reading one of my crazy dreams. :)

I was wandering around a very large, Victorian-style house. It was evening and growing darker. My dorm room was over on one side of the house. I had a diary there with a little lock on it that I was going to bring to Steve to try unlocking with his lock-picking tools. I instead locked up my dorm room and went out into the hall where I found my father sitting on a couch. We sat together and talked for a while about something funny.

I went to a basketball game and found my old pep band there in the bleachers. I had forgotten to bring my saxophone, however, so I couldn’t play. I didn’t really want to, though, anyway. I looked to my left and saw Ashley and several of my old friends staring at the band. Kim sat beside me and played her saxophone while Sean sat to my right, playing a baritone. I kept griping at him because he was off-beat. Our band director was getting angry. I saw Erin across the room in a white-and-gold cheerleading uniform. Her hair was in a ponytail and she was cheering with the rest of her squad.

The dream shifted and I was back in the Victorian house but now it was nighttime. A lot of little kids had become zombies like in Night of the Living Dead; they were trying to kill/eat me and my friends. I ran into a bedroom with other people that were still alive but the door wouldn’t lock. To keep the zombies out, we had to all lean against it. Hermes from Futurama was there. Myself and some other guy, a blond around my age, had to leave to get something or other so we ran out together and dodged the zombies, who were quite slow.

When running back from across the house, we held hands so we wouldn’t get separated. There was a curtain strung across one end of a room and I thought there was a solid wall behind it. I started to panic because the only other exit back to the bedroom was blocked off by zombies. The guy, however, leapt at one end of the curtain and brushed it aside; there was a hole cut out in the wall beyond just big enough for us to jump through. We got back into the bedroom just in time.

For some reason, everyone wanted to leave a little later. They climbed out the window and I followed them. They all climbed down the roof and down a ladder that was sitting there but I stayed on the roof. I was still sitting next to the two white windows, though. Although they had knobs on them on the outside for adjusting how hard they were to open, one of the adjustors was broken and I didn’t feel safe there. I was surprised that zombies hadn’t come into the bedroom yet. I looked around at the ground below and, although it was dark, I could still tell there weren’t any zombies around. I quickly climbed down the ladder, moved it to a different spot of the roof, and climbed back up.

I ended up sitting on the ridge of the roof rather uncomfortably, especially since it was windy. Steve suddenly appeared beside me and asked me if I had brought his German. Apparently, he had created a new set of German characters to write in and wanted me to preserve them. I told him I had and he was grateful.

The dream shifted again and I was back on the ground at the front of the house. I hadn’t seen any zombies for a long while so I wasn’t as nervous. There was some lady that was acting strangely and so I hugged her. She whispered in my ear that she could tell I was one of them; she thanked God for that. I walked over to a group of people where some lady was talking loudly, addressing the group. She said something like, “The artificials have been around for years but it’s only been in the last two days that people have wanted to kill them.” “Artificials” referring to artificial humans.

Wow, it’s been a while, at least for me, since I last updated this. A rundown of the past few days:

Monday: I don’t even remember what happened so perhaps nothing interesting did.

Tuesday: I enjoyed a freezing walk through alternating drizzle and pounding rain in order to get to Central Baptist hospital to meet with Lonny, Maggie, and Jackson to work on our Spanish presentation. We were meeting at the hospital’s library since Lonny works there and wanted us to meet there in particular. I suppose it was more convenient for him. Anyway, Jackson was supposed to pick Maggie and I up but that never happened so we began walking before we realized that the hospital was a great deal further than we had originally thought. We walked another fifty miles to get my car and I drove us the rest of the way in warmth although we were still rather wet. The meeting was productive although Jackson never did show up. We called him and he gave some dumb excuse but said that he’d make up a posterboard for his visual aid which was fine.

Wednesday: I was somewhat nervous about the Spanish presentation but it actually went really well. I’m glad to have it over with now. I just have to write a 300-word essay about what I presented and I’m through. My CS 115 lab test, however, did not. I used up all fifty minutes on that thing and never did get it to work. This was quite frustrating as Jessica, who took the test on Monday, said it was really easy. I guess I just overthought the thing; I have a tendency to do that and it’s really annoying. I had arrays and for loops and if statements coming out the wazoo, but then I found out afterward that arrays weren’t to be used at all. Bah.

I had a pow-wow yesterday evening for Jessica and I to get program 5 finished because we were still quite stuck on how to go about it. Tony called me and wanted my help on program 5 which I laughed at because I found out that he was further along than I. He ended up coming to my little pow-wow as well. So, after the four of us had eaten dinner, I ended up hanging out with Jessica, Steve, and Tony for a good two-and-a-half to three hours yesterday evening. By the time everyone had left, we all had program 5 working. Hooray! Here’s a photo I snapped of the three of them; from left to right, they’re Tony, Steve, and Jessica. I don’t know if Jess is just not photogenic or if I just have bad timing but photos I take of her always turn out like that, with that same expression and everything.

That was such a relief to have that thing finished. I’m now in a great mood because I only have a paper for honors to write by Tuesday and I have to finish my Spanish essay which I’m already mostly done with. I’m not even worried about finals. Sure, I’m concerned about making good grades on the two that I have, but I’m not panicky yet or anything. Maybe come Tuesday that will be different. Hopefully not.

Why Will You Go To Hell?
“You forgot to flush the toilet once in a public washroom. Innocent, yes, but you are absent-minded and slovenly, and slovenly people go to the Bad Place. You slice of filth!”

Seven Deadly Sins
Envy 94%
Sloth 81%
Pride 75%
Gluttony 75%
Lust 69%
Wrath 62%
Greed 25%

Which Social Status Are You?
Your determination has soared you this high, yet not high enough to enjoy the luxuries of the upper class. Your most valued posession is your country club membership which is kept framed in the office.
Upper middle Class 79%
Luxurious Upper Class 75%
Middle Class 67%
alternative 38%
Lower Class 29%

I also discovered I rather like the art of H.R. Giger. Here are some of my favorites so far:
mirror image
friedrich kuhn II
debbie III
doppeltorso mit haken
cataract

In modern-day America, when one hears the name “Santa Claus,” it can be assumed that the first image that will come to mind will be that of a portly old man in a red suit who, one night per year, distributes gifts to well-behaved children around the world. Connections to images of a kind grandfatherly figure, hard-working elves, and playful reindeer are instantly made. Some origins behind this well-known and well-loved character are not as jolly, however.

The man upon whom the figure of Santa Claus is based was Bishop Nicholas of Smyrna in what is now Turkey. He lived in the fourth century A.D. as a rich man that was known for being generous to children. It is said that he would even, on occasion, throw gifts through the windows of impoverished children. The Orthodox church held Nicholas in high esteem and, eventually, he became St. Nicholas, patron saint of both seafarers and children alike. His name day is December 6.

In many traditional tales, St. Nicholas is said to deliver gifts to good little boys and girls. In France, Luxembourg, Switzerland, and Belgium, the stories say that he leads around a donkey carrying baskets full of presents and treats. In other traditions, he is said to ride a white horse which is sometimes known as Schimmel.

There are many different names for this beloved character besides the more well-known ones of Santa Claus and St. Nicholas. “Sinterklaas” is a common name in the Netherlands and sometimes in Belgium, Germany, and Poland. When the Dutch immigrated to America, they naturally brought their customs and beliefs with them. One of them that came along was that of Sinterklaas. In Germany, mostly in the Protestant northern and central parts, he is also known as “Der Weinachtsmann.”

In some places St. Nicholas is said to wear long red robes and carry a bishop’s hook. In other places, he wears robes of green. A velvet jacket and some type of cap is often involved.

St. Nicholas is often described as traveling with assistants, some of whom are less than desirable. During the Middle Ages, Hollanders sometimes referred to the devil as “Black Peter,” or “Zwarte Piet.” St. Nicholas is said to have enslaved Black Peter and put him in chains. On St. Nicholas’ Eve, December 4, St. Nicholas makes his assistant listen down the chimneys of houses to check the behavior of the children within. If they have been good, candies and toys are dropped down into the children’s shoes below. There is another interpretation of Black Peter that describes him as a Moor and not the devil.

There are other folk tales that have the devil as an assistant to St. Nicholas. Many Czech and Slovac stories, as well as those from Austria and other Eastern European areas, describe a furred devil with horns and a long, red tongue being doomed to serve St. Nicholas.

Even if the assistant is not specifically said to be the devil, he can still be a frightening creature. Schmutzli of Switzerland is described as being a bearded, brown-haired figure whose skin is so covered in lard and grime that even it appears brown. He carries a sack and a bundle of switches. Children were told that if they were naughty, Schmutzli would first switch them and then carry them off in his sack to eat them.

Père Fouettard, also known as Housécker, is a legend of France and Luxembourg. He is said to be an evil butcher that once lured children into his shop. Because of such trespasses, he is doomed to follow St. Nicholas and help him deliver presents.

Perhaps the American equivalent of St. Nicholas’ helpers could be the elves, who are usually seen as benign and cheerful creatures. Certainly it is not a tradition in the United States to tell your children of devils and other scary figures that help out one of their most beloved childhood figures. The idea of Santa Claus traveling with the aid of animals still remains, although the animal of choice has changed from a horse or a donkey to reindeer.

Newspapers and other forms of media started the idea that Santa Claus lives at the North Pole when he’s in his off season. In 1925, the media also said that since grazing reindeer would not be possible at the North Pole, Santa Claus actually lived in the Finnish Lapland in Korvatunturi, or “Ear Fell.” The fell is shaped somewhat like the ears of a rabbit. These are said to be the ears of Santa with which he listens to the children of the world to make sure they are behaving.

Despite the changes in dress and accompaniment, the legend of Santa Claus and his cohorts remains a big part of the holiday traditions of many countries to this day. It seems that such a nice idea that corresponds to the cheerful spirit and generosity of the season will continue to have a place in the world for some time to come.

I’m quite full now. I put off eating for a while because I was busy working on my honors paper and tooling around online. I finally gave in and had some microwave chicken dinner (mediocre) and some chips with salsa (spiffin’). Now I’m chatting with Trin and Erin while chewing a huge wad of Bubblicious.

I love the song “Sin” by Nine Inch Nails. I’ve been listening to a lot of their music recently (”La Mer” is playing now, for example) and I love all of it.

you give me the reason
you give me control
i gave you my purity
my purity you stole
did you think i wouldn’t recognize
this compromise
am i just too stupid to realize
stale incense old sweat
and lies lies lies

**Chorus:
it comes down to this
your kiss
your fist
and your strain
it gets under my skin
within
take in
the extent of my sin

you give me the anger
you give me the nerve
carry out my sentence
will i get what i deserve
i’m just an effigy to be disgraced
to be defaced
your need for me has been replaced
and if i can’t have everything
well then just give me a taste

**Repeat chorus

you give me the reason
you give me control
i gave you my purity
my purity you stole
did you think i wouldn’t recognize
this compromise
am i just too stupid to realize
stale incense old sweat
and lies lies lies

it comes down to this
your kiss
your fist
and your strain
it gets under my skin
within
take in
well my sin
it comes down to this
your kiss
your fist
and your strain
it’s fucking under my skin
within
take in
the extent of my sin

– Sin by Nine Inch Nails

I just returned from my CS 115 final and I think I did really well. It was surprisingly easy which is often a bad sign but I feel that I aced it. I finished in forty minutes and then Jessica drove me back to south campus as she had some errands to run that involved the use of her car anyway. Thank God for her is all I have to say, especially since she offered to drive me to my calculus final tonight. The Weather Channel is saying that while it’s actually 24°F here, it only feels like 12°F. Joy. I’d say it felt colder than that at 7:30 this morning when I was walking to the Classroom Building.

I hate waiting around for things. My second and last final is tonight at 8:30 but I’d much rather be on my way home now. I’ll probably spend the rest of the day hanging out in the dorm and keeping warm. I’ll study more as well although I’m feeling pretty good about the final, surprisingly.

I went to the Midnight Crunch Brunch last night with Steve. Quite fun. The MCB is something that UK apparently holds either each semester or just for the fall semester, I don’t know which, at finals time. It lasts from 9p-12a and offers free breakfast food (hence the name), music, various games, and, perhaps best of all, massages. Steve picked out a particularly long line for us to wait in last night with the idea that it was the massage line. Well, when we made it to the front, we discovered that it was actually the line to get Tubby Smith’s signature. He’s apparently the men’s basketball coach, as I found out from Jess today. So we got the free MCB shirts everyone had received signed before heading over to the other particularly long line which, fortunately, was indeed the massage line.

Ended up watching the movie Boondock Saints yesterday and enjoying it.

Nine in the morning is just too early to be conversing with any amount of coherence. A discussion between Trin and I about finals:
(09:13:21) Trinity: i just wish i could get them all over with today and tomorrow. i dont want to be sitting around here until friday.
(09:13:39) Noir: will you?
(09:13:48) Trinity: no. cant.
(09:15:59) Noir: i meant will you be sitting there until friday. ?
(09:21:41) Trinity: no, i have one final on wednesday and another on friday.
(09:23:47) Noir: so you’ll be sitting around until friday?
(09:24:01) Trinity: what?
(09:24:33) Noir: you have to stay on campus till friday for your finals?
(09:24:40) Trinity: yes.
(09:24:49) Noir: man, did we just go around that subject about four times? :D
(09:24:57) Trinity: i think so.
(09:25:18) Trinity: i was thinking literally “sitting” here until friday.
(09:25:35) Noir: lol. no!

I’ve rediscovered my love of Audioslave and their song “Hypnotize” in particular.

Well, if you set your mind upon it
I know that you can
You got everything you wanted
You’ve done everything you plan

So let me make an offer
I’m only trying to help
You can make your load just a little lighter
All you got to do is share the wealth

Oh no, don’t you keep your good luck to yourself
Oh no, don’t you keep your good luck to yourself

Well I know you’ve got problems
I see it in your eyes
But if you want to live to see the morning
Give it up to your brother or you get a surprise

Oh no, don’t you keep your good luck to yourself
Oh no, don’t you keep your good luck to yourself

Well it’s time to see
You’ve got to give or you’re gonna receive
Hey it’s time to see
You’ve got to give if you wanna believe
You will breathe
It’s time to see

Oh no, don’t you keep your good luck to yourself
Oh no, don’t you keep your good luck to yourself

PA Police Apologize for Scissors Arrest

“The police chief and the head of the city’s schools apologized Monday to the mother of a 10-year-old girl who was arrested and handcuffed after she brought a pair of scissors to school in her backpack.”

How remarkably stupid is that shit? I couldn’t believe it when I first heard of this. They’re arresting little kids because they have scissors? I guess no more construction paper cut-outs to decorate the halls, unless the kiddies start using their teeth. Lord knows these are dangerous weapons.