Friday, April 30, 2004--Today, I skipped CS61B Discussion... at least I think I did. Like I said yesterday, all these entries were posted on May 12, because of my... Business? Busy-ness? Something.
So I went to TBP and dropped off the packets and heard the most elegant argument against Affirmative Action. I'll post it up someday, but the gist of it is that simply assuming that just because someone is black that it means that they are poor and have no education and need you to give them all these benefits just because they suck would be offensive to black people.
Yeah, apparently the Republicans held an Affirmative Action Bake Sale. "Oh, you're a white male? You're cookies cost $3." "Oh, you're a black female? You're cookies cost 50 cents." The guy telling the story triggered a discussion about Affirmative Action and about its pros and cons.
Then, I had a bagel.
After that, I dropped off the HKN Packet.
Also, I went to Eudemonia and bought 3
Magma Slivers, so now my Sliver deck is
proxy-free! Woot!
CS61B Lecture...
Finally, I went home.
Dice Roll of the Day: 5 + 3 = 8
Ahh... now it's time to say "Good Night!"
Thursday, April 29, 2004--Sorry I haven't been updating for the last week or two. I've been busy. I don't remember with what. Let's dig around and see if I can find out. I actually don't remember if I went to Physics 7C Lecture today...
Yeah... anyways... I believe the reason I was so busy today was because of the Eta Kappa Nu and Tau Beta Pi Candidate Packets that I had to finish &c. Yeah... they were good, though.
Math 55 Lecture...
History 160 Lecture...
I think I skipped fencing today on the account that I was still kind of sick and that I had to work on the packets. *shrug* If I remember anything new, I'll post an addendum.
Dice Roll of the Day: 4 + 4 = 8
Good Night...
Wednesday, April 28, 2004--I have the Andorhal Plague. First one to tell me where else I used that phrase gets an eCookie.
A Year Ago Today:
- "I talked with the wind today. She has a really nice voice..."
- "But I thought you liked doing stuff? What is there for you to do?"
Today, I gladly discovered that there was neither EE nor CS homework. Yay! CS Lab was also cancelled, since they held it last week because Prof Shewchuk forgot to put up last week's lab. Heh. Yay again!
Meeting with Prof Meyer to arrange the Course Surveys for EE242 on behalf of Eta Kappa Nu...
Math 55 Discussion...
CS61B Lecture...
Me resting...
Dice Roll of the Day: 2 + 5 = 7
My journal is so boring...
Good Night!
I love you...
Tuesday, April 27, 2004--I meant to go to Physics 7C Lecture today. Really, I did. Unfortunately, with the whole disease thing, I was feeling too weak to wake up at 7am.
EE40 Lecture...
Slept...
At lunch, I saw Kim sitting there eating by herself. I would have eaten with her, but I was ravaged by a disease and I didn't want to risk spreading the plague to her. That would be bad.
At least I think it was Kim. I was
deliriously sick. If you were the person who I was talking to at lunch in the Crossroads on Tuesday, IM me.
Math 55 Lecture...
History 160 Lecture...
Slept some more...
Drink lots of water when your sick! You sweat a lot when you sleep when your sweat. I believe that's a sign of fever.
So at night, I wake up at 8pm with a headache. Ow!
A Year Ago Today: I tear open my arm on a Soda Fountain
Dice Roll of the Day: 1 + 6 = 7
Good Night, peoples!
Monday, April 26, 2004--Math 55 Discussion...
Physics 7C Discussion...
EE40 Discussion...
CS61B Lecture...
Fencing...
Upon coming back, I finally decided that I was sick and that I should get some rest... so I did.
A Year Ago Today: BAMM... we lose in the semi-finals to Homestead... There was a seeding error, and we should have faced them in the finals, because we were by far the second best team.
Dice Roll of the Day: 5 + 3 = 8
*shrug* Good Night.
Sunday, April 25, 2004--I've added an
addendum for Friday, about the Board Game Night as well as A Year Ago Today for yesterday.
Anyways, after eating brunch at the Crossroads, I played my Sliver deck against Ryan's Fling deck. First deck, he beat me pretty quickly. Second game, I beat him with a Sliver rush. Third game, he beat me pretty quickly. Heh... amewsing.
Then, Mark, Ryan, and I went to Games of Berkeley, just to take a look around. Then, we went to
Eudemonia, where I bought enough cards to bring the proxy count on my Sliver deck from 23 to 3.
A Year Ago Today: "Then I wrote, 'Then I wrote, "Then I wrote, 'Then I wrote...'"' Let's not continue that infinite recursion."
Hmm... that seems to be all. What a boring day!
Well, I did watch the Simpsons.
Dice Roll of the Day: 5 + 2 = 7
Good Night! Don't let the succubi bite! (It's been too long since I've last said that... I give an eProp to whomever tells me when was the last time I said that line.)
Saturday, April 24, 2004--Today is the BAMM. The Leland Team will be competing. I had hoped that they could get into at least the Finals this time, since Homestead was out of the picture. Unfortunately, I later learned from Lei we again made it only to the Semi-finals. Oh well.
Strangely enough, Joanna was placed on the top team while Stephanie was placed on the lower team. Hmm... I always thought Stephanie was better. Maybe it's just that Joanna is faster, like how Ke is faster than me, so he dominated BAMM last year, too.
Heh, he dominated BAMM two years ago, too. I remember Kristi and I were just barely managing until the lower team was eliminated so Ke could join our team again. Kristi... I miss her. I wonder whatever happened to her.
Mindy: She went to UCSD.
A Year Ago Today: I get out Infinite Slivers for the third time... and I think never again... or at least not one that was noteworthy enough for my journal.
Anyways, today, I went to do the "Geek Olympics" with Tau Beta Pi, but she didn't show up...
So yeah, while waiting for the other people, we first played Blob Tag.
Me: What are we playing?
Girl: We're playing Blob Tag. Since I just caught you--
Me: (not really)
Girl: --we now have to link our arms and run as one.
Me: I can do that.
Later...
Her: We need to just pick one person and try to catch them.
Me: Someone slow... no, no,
NOT someone slow!
The thing is, if we catch someone slow and absorb them into the blob, it'll slow the blob down. Hmm... I think I ended up whipping Stephanie around too much, but yeah, it was pretty fun, especially when the blob got so big that it split into two, and then from there, the non-blob people slowly all got caught and it was game over. Heh, shortly after the blob split, the runners did some kind of maneuver and the two blobs ran into each other. It was pretty bad. Oh well.
Then, we played this cat and mouse game, except that the mouse can switch out with other people. It was pretty crazy. At one point, I was the mouse, and I was running around. Then, I slipped, and I was like "Oh shit!" Then, I scrambled over and tagged a guy to get a new mouse in. Heh, at least it wasn't as bad as the girl who fell over and screamingly crawled over to a line to tag another dude in.
Anyways, afterwards, the games began. We split off into two teams, and after much of no one having any idea what to call our team, Angela suggested Team Sexy... prolly since she wore a shirt that said "Sexy" on it. She then said the other team could call themselves "Team Mofo" because one of the girls (Cindy was her name, I think) had a hat that said "Mofo" on it. Then, the other team said that they were called whatever our team name was plus Sucks at the end, so they were "Team Sexy Sucks", which I think was pretty frivolous.
We first did the electric fence, where we had a wall of rope and we had to slip people through the rope without touching it. Vincent "died" because he looked when we told him to tuck his head in and close his eyes. By moving his head, he ran into the rope and lost. Darn...
Then, we did the blindfolded shapes game. Thanks to our ingenious system by counting off and using our numbers to guide our shape-making, we finished it in 6 minutes, whereas the other team took nearly 20 minutes. We rock!
Then, we had to hold a bucket of water in the air with just our feet and then we had to take our shoes off in sequence and put them back on. It was ridiculous, but we pulled it off. The other team, however, kept spilling small specks of water until
finally, they dropped the entire bucket and
LOST.
Then, there was the relay race, which was really illegit since Heena kept making our team members redo things, but we still won anyway. Then, there was the controversial "broken egg" thing, which was probably bullshit since the egg certainly wasn't broken when Vincent did his uber-jump rope thing.
Anyways, we had a break for the BBQ... then came the final round, the 14-legged race. It's like a 3-legged race, but instead 2 people we had 13 people. Then, we coordinated a system of walking altogether. Unfortunately, we had to walk down, then walk back. Since it was too much of a hassle to turn around, we decided to walk backwards. However, that proved to be our downfall. We were uber-efficient going forward, but going backward, we kept falling over, and the team finally over took us as we scrambled backward for the finish. One major problem was that even though only one person was supposed to count, everyone else started counting, too, which totally threw off our rhythm, and people didn't step at quite the right time, which caused the falling overs. The worst part was when the other team won, and we just stopped, then Heena informed us that we had to finish the race and that they were still timing us, which delayed us a good 5-10 seconds.
In the end, since we lost the 14-legged race by a such a huge margin, the other team won, even though we were winning beforehand. They said that they came from behind.
Me: Actually, you came from in front, since we were walking backwards.
Hmm... walking backwards was
my idea... whoops!
Ah, well. We still had fun.
Me: I demand a Tug of War!
Heena: Unfortunately, we do not have a rope that strong.
Me: Darn...
Ah, well. We still had fun. ...Wait, I said that already.
After I got back to the dorm, I talked to Justin about how Franklin was a bad deckbuilder but a fantastic duelist and how Ryan was a good duelist but a spectacular deckbuildinger. Justin then said that he could beat anyone with an inferior deck no matter how good a duelist he was. I then said we should try it by giving Ryan the
Transference deck and see if he can win. Ryan decides to look over the deck, and I hand him the
Arcbound Ravager that he could use as his trump card, but since Ryan wanted to look over the deck first, we wouldn't play until
after dinner.
After dinner, Justin plays against Ryan, and Ryan wins the first game with the Ravager. Nice! Second and third game, Justin wins. Then, Ryan uses my constructed Arcbound deck and still loses.
Justin: Well, I lost the first one, but I won the next three in a row, so I guess that redeems me.
Ryan: No, you still lost to a Pre-constructed deck.
Mark: Yeah, you lost to JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG JENG!
Me: Why isn't KUO or WU or CHAO as catchy as JENG?
Ryan: Because I made it catchy.
I suppose that's true... or maybe it's the NG in JENG. It buzzes funnily.
Then, I make some changes to my
Slivers to make them more efficient and I duel Justin's goblins and lose... but I found out that
Magma Slivers are
hella good. With just a
little bit of help, they can kill
Goblin Goons, which is a
damn amazing thing.
Yes, Justin has good deck advice. I know this because his version of my Arcbound deck was better than William's.
Dice Roll of the Day: 1 + 6 = 7
In retrospect, yesterday's entry was short, but today's entry was
long.
Anyways, I'm still tired. I declined a few games of DOTA in favor of getting to sleep early. Actually many of these journal entries since the 15th were posted within the last 2 or 3 days since I've been so busy with work. This one was posted on Sunday, actually.
Anyways, that's all I have to say. Hope you had fun reading, even if you didn't.
Good Night!
Friday, April 23, 2004--CS61B Discussion... Ali gave back the mudterm (I got perfect score) and then went over it.
After that, I had no classes, since Physics Lab is over and Shewchuk was at the faculty retreat (like Sanders), so CS61B Lecture was cancelled.
I decided to be a good student, however, and spent my time doing the Physics Homework.
I went to Board Game Night with Eta Kappa Nu and I learned how to play Settlers of Catan, which is a fun game! First game, I built a really long road and got the Longest Road award... but I still lost anyway. Second game, the board was randomized so that there was no lumber and no bricks... which is bad, since those are the most basic of resources. It was pretty insane. Everyone was getting Development Cards and trying to steal each others' material. It's my fault, though, since I randomized the board. Dwayne of the Cursehand, eh?
Later... that's all I remember. I believe I turned down playing DOTA because I was so fucking tired.
Anyways, Good Nights, y'all!
Dice Roll of the Day: 1 + 6 = 7
Thursday, April 22, 2004--Physics 7C Lecture... Sourav Mandal was giving a special lecture about Quantum Field Theory and String Theory. It was interesting. It's the best lecture so far, since, despite having only 5 hours of sleep last night, I managed to stay awake the entire time. Wow...
EE40 Lecture... was cancelled today because Prof Sanders was at the Faculty retreat.
EE40 Lab... we finished our TuteBot. Now all we need to do is add batteries.
Math 55 Lecture... I found out that that lady (I thought her name was Olga something something?) was subbing for Prof Demmel today. I don't like her much, but supposedly she's teaching Math H90 next semester. How... interesting.
History 160 Lecture...
A Year Ago Today:
- Alan builds a blue deck with barely any land, lots of blue instants, 4 Cognivores, for a total of 180 cards.
- I beat it using Infinite Slivers (well, technically I was one turn away... I had Heartstone, Ashnod's Altar, and a Riptide Shapeshifter in play). This is the second time I used Infinite Slivers.
Then, I went to the Tau Beta Pi general meeting. It was pretty funny, with all the performances there. Mimi was there... one of those people in both Tau Beta Pi
and Eta Kappa Nu, and the first person to know that I was in both.
Then, Angela gave me a challenge to open a shaken up soda with my teeth so she could make a kick-ass video. I do it, but the first soda was dead, so we try again. I'm hoping to see that video soon.
Then, Heena gives me a challenge to do an Indian dance with her. At first, I'm reluctant, but then she takes me by the arm and leads me to an open area of the room to teach me the Indian dance.
As if to seal my fate, while passing by Karen, she says, "I think that's a
really good challenge!" Well, I suppose it's nice to see Karen so supportive... I think...
Yeah, Angela caught the entire thing on video... which I'm also hoping to see. In retrospect, it wasn't too bad. Everyone was telling me I did good for my first time.
Anyways,
Dice Roll of the Day: 2 + 1 = 3
Good Night, sirs!
Wednesday, April 21, 2004--CS61B Lab... our lab was to get at least one point on the autograder for Project 3. Heh... I ended up finishing part of my project. It was an easy project.
Math 55 Discussion...
I went to buy the sticky pads I would need for my EE40 TuteBot.
CS61B Lecture...
I went to the Telebears Advising for Tau Beta Pi... only one guy showed up at the EECS table for advice, and he was doing the EECS minor. Interesting, considering that most Berkeley Engineers are in EECS. Probably the EECS people already figured out what they wanted to take early, though, since Telebears was already kinda started.
CS Homework was fun... make a maze. I'm tired, though...
A Year Ago Today:
- I win with Coalition Victory for the first time.
- "Dwayne, you tapped out. I play Vengeance on your Sliver Queen." I sac a token to Ashnod's Altar to get 2 mana for the Clot Sliver's ability to regernate the Sliver Queen.
Dice Roll of the Day: 1 + 2 = 3
Good Night...
Tuesday, April 20, 2004--Physics 7C Lecture... I haven't been there for a while... except Prof Battaglia was gone, and a TA lectured in his place... or maybe it was Prof Lee, I dunno, I never met Lee. The dude went over Schroedinger's Equation and how to solve them to get all these weird crap going on, like quantum tunnelling (a quantum particle passing through the quantum equivalent of a solid wall).
EE40 Lecture...
EE40 Lab... our TuteBot is coming along quite nicely.
Math 55 Lecture...
History 160 Lecture...
HKN General Meeting #3...
That's pretty much all I can remember. I've been tired lately... too little sleep.
Dice Roll of the Day: 2 + 1 = 3
Good Night, yo!
Monday, April 19, 2004--
Happy Birthday Little Rabbit Diane Ko!
Yeah, um... yeah.
Math 55 Discussion...
Physics 7C Discussion...
EE40 Discussion... we got our Mudterms back. Apparently, I was two standard deviations above the mean and they will curve it. Woot! The part that worries me is, though, the part I thought I did the worst I actually did the best, and the part I thought I did the best I actually did the worst. It was because I got question 3 part A (a 5 point question) wrong, so I lost 4 points there. But then because I got it wrong, I lost 2 of 10 points in part B and 1 of 5 points in part C, so because of that one mistake, I lose 7 points, which is worth more than the problem. WTF!
CS61B Lecture... Bucket Sort! Woot! Linear time sorting algorithms. Sweet!
A Year Ago Today: I pull of Infinite Slivers for the first time ever.
Hmm... it makes me want to make an Infinite Sliver deck, just for fun, even if it's not powerful enough to win. I'll just use it on all the newbies, and when they complain that it's too powerful, I'll show them my R-G Sliver Beatdown deck.
Then, I went fencing.
Dice Roll of the Day: 2 + 4 = 6
Tired... Zzz... Good Night... Zzz...
Sunday, April 18, 2004--Lunch with Jackie at Cheesecake Factory... pasta is good. Jackie wanted me to convince her that she should go to Berkeley, except that everything that I thought was a good thing was a bad thing to her. Whoops!
Because I was impatient, later, I walked down to Software Etc and bought a
Transference deck for $12 because I was too impatient to wait until coming back to Berkeley. Good thing, too, since it was raining today at Berkeley, and I didn't want to have walk in the rain for half an hour just to save $2.
So I dueled Transference against Justin's goblins and lose.
Then, I duel Transference against Justin's zombies, and it's pretty even. Toward the end, Justin builds a large army and he attacks and he thinks he wins. However, I bounce up his
Twisted Abomination with
Echoing Truth. Then, I sac my stuff and somehow get all my counters to the
Spire Golem, making him an 8/10. Then, I double
Skullclamp him, making him a 10/8. Then, since Spire Golem flies, I swing him in for the kill.
Then, I play Transference against his U-G Madness, and I lose utterly to some
Wurms.
Later, I played Mark, my Transference against my leftoever U-W deck. First, I beat him once. Then, he beats me once (because of cards like
Nomad Decoy and
Leonin Elder). Lucky for me the
Voltaic Construct is a good counter to the Nomad Decoy. In the third game, there was utter stalemate, except Mark had a clock on me with his
Covert Operative dealing 3 to me each turn. Later, I Echoing Truthed his Operative, and then when I was at 5 life, I sac'ed a
Pacified Arcbound Crusher who had 15 counters on him to the
Rust Elemental to put his counters on the
Spincrusher.
Then, I attacked with the Spincrusher and other dudes, using his ability to make him unblockable, to hit Mark for heavy damage, bringing him down to 1 Life. At that moment, I realized I had made a mistake. First, I should have waited 1 more turn (a turn I could afford, since I bounced the Covert Spy). That way, I'd have enough counters for a one-hit kill. Second, when I did attack, I shouldn't have attacked with the Voltaic Construct ('cause Mark blocked and killed it). I should have left him alive so I can untap my fliers to block his fliers so that I could live, but I didn't and he broke through for the win. Yeah, it was a game I should have won, but failed thanks only to my own mistakes. Oh, well.
Then, I went back to my dorm.
Simpsons was interesting today.
"Then, the coal mine collapsed. None of us got out alive, not even Willy!"
--Groundskeeper Willy
Dice Roll of the Day: 4 + 2 = 6
*yawn* I'm so tired.
Good Night!
Saturday, April 17, 2004--I spent the morning playing
GunBound with Franklin. Then, I started looking at all the forum stuff on the internet since I hadn't looked at it in a while.
Later, we went to Jasmine's place for dinner. There was Jeffrey and Connie Ho, Kevin and Jerry Chang, and some others I can't remember. Shortly after Jasmine showed up (seemingly from nowhere... although I suspect she came out from locking herself in the room), we (meaning everyone who had nothing better to do) watched
Cheaper by the Dozen, which wasn't that great, although Hilary Duff was in it. I found out, though, just how whiny Hilary Duff can be.
Dinner... I like eggrolls.
Then, Frank and I went back home and we played MTG. He liked my
Transference deck so much, he bought it off of me. I decided to be nice, so I sold it to him for $10, though, the price I got it at. We dueled about four times against my constructed Arcbound deck. He managed to beat me once, though, with a huge-ass
Rust Elemental. It was pretty good, considering he was playing with a weaker deck.
Dice Roll of the Day: 5 + 3 = 8
Slay!
Good Night!
Friday, April 16, 2004--I woke up extra early today to go to CS61B Discussion... just to find out that Mudterms aren't returned yet. In fact, they haven't even started grading them yet! Grr...
Rushing to finish Physics Homework... and I succeeded!
Then, I ran out and bought the
Transference Darksteel Preconstructed Theme deck. It has
Arcbounds and 2
Skullclamps, which are worth $5 a piece. Yet, the deck only costed me $10. It's like I bought two Skullclamps and got 59 other cards for free!
Physics 7C Lab... last one of the year... I'll miss the
LASER BEAMS (pulled a page from Ryan Chao's book there).
CS61B Lecture... we watched a video about sorting. It included 3 Insertion Sorts, 3 Exchange Sorts, and 3 Selection Sorts. However, it didn't include Merge Sort.
Me: What happened to Merge Sort?
Prof Shewchuk: I don't know. I guess they just decided not to include it when they made the selection.
*class laughs*
No, I didn't find it funny either, but I thought I might as well add it here, just in case you guys might be amused by it.
Then, I went back home, finally. Franklin showed me so many card tricks. He's gotten quite sneaky with them tricks. The first time I saw them, I was like "Holy shit!!!" Then, Franklin showed them to me again (yes, he
does know the rule that you never show a guy the same trick twice... he was letting me see them again to see if I could catch the trick), and this time, although I couldn't see it, I could guess the trick. Then, I showed Franklin the 3x3, pick the column card trick, which is all mathematical and no hand-waving.
Anyways, that was all. I'm tired, so I shall be going to sleep. Good Night!
Dice Roll of the Day: 2 + 6 = 8
Thursday, April 15, 2004--EE40 Mudterm #2... it was
ridiculously hard. Granted, I wouldn't be worried if it were curved, but it isn't. I'd be happy if I broke 35.
A Year Ago Today:
- Math 78 Evaluations: "This class lacks entertainment value." "Mr. Langlois is a cool guy. Give him a raise or something."
- "I failed to realize that 5 was also 10 divided by 2."
- I officially qualify for the USAMO! Woot!
Math 55 Lecture... We finished the Gore VS Bush thing.
History 160 Lecture...
Later today, I fenced... I don't remember a thing, though, except for some reason I really kicked ass today, even though I had a weird cough thing.
Dice Roll of the Day: 6 + 2 = 8
*yawn* Good Night!
Wednesday, April 14, 2004--I have some
addendums for April 9 and yesterday.
CS61B Lab... it was easy...
too easy...
Math 55 Discussion...
CS61B Lecture...
Boring day... I have to "study" for my EE40 tomorrow.
Dice Roll of the Day: 5 + 4 = 9
Moo?
Good Night!
Tuesday, April 13, 2004--I skipped my Physics 7C Lecture since I couldn't wake up on time... You know what? From now on, if I omit a class, just assume that I skipped it for various reasons.
EE40 Lecture... so I was asking Daisy and Ellen what classes I need to take.
On an unrelated note,
Me: Hmm... we have a midterm on Thursday. I should prolly read the book.
Daisy: Maybe you don't have to. You're hella smart!
Me: And where did you hear that from?
Daisy: Aren't you a Freshman?
Me: Heh, yeah, I suppose that's true.
EE40 Lab... We got our TuteBots today. (Tute is short for Tutorial... I think.)
Then, I went to my Advising Group Session with Prof Gastpar, who's specialty is in Communications. Incidentally, my parents want me to go into Communications, but I'm personally not sure at all.
Math 55 Lecture...
So Professor Demmel was doing this example about voting, if it's really close, what is the probability that the wrong guy won, so he was like, "Let's name some random candidates... how about G and B, and these are the results at an unknown location called F." *class laughs* "Yes, there were a lot of papers writting on the probability involved in elections, most of them were written 4 years ago... in the year 2000."
Yes, he was doing it on purpose.
History 160 Lecture...
Hmm...
Dice Roll of the Day: 4 + 4 = 8
Hmm... Good Night!
Monday, April 12, 2004--Math 55 Discussion...
Physics 7C Discussion...
I skipped my EE40 Discussion because it's useless and because I wanted to have time to "prepare" for my CS61B Mudterm.
CS61B Mudterm... I failed miserably... at finishing early. Otherwise, I did pretty well. Heh, I had printed out notes from 6 lectures and I used all of them except 1. Good thing I printed out all them notes, eh?
And I ran into Melody on my way back from the RSF after fencing circa 10pm.
Dice Roll of the Day: 3 + 5 = 8
I also discovered today that I have
no idea what I want to study here at Berkeley. EECS is a pretty broad field!
Good Night!
Sunday, April 11, 2004--Today, I played basketball with the engineers. TBP vs HKN, yo! ...and I'm in
both groups. Heh...
You know, I think Mimi was the first to know that I was in both HKN and TBP, because one day at an HKN meeting, she said to me, "Hey, I recognize you! I saw you at TBP." Next was prolly Daisy or Tanya or Victoria, whom are
also in both HKN and TBP. And just today, Amy and Peter and all the other people at the basketball even found out. Heh...
A Year Ago Today: I beat FF5.
When I came back, I tested my Arcbound deck... then I played FFX-2, won the Sphere Break tournament, beat Garik, saved O'aka's shop, and got myself 3 new Dresspheres--Lady Luck, Trainer, and Berserker. Now, all I have left to get is the Mascot Dressphere, and I have a full collection.
Oh, and Garik was an easy boss.
Then, I ate dinner, saw Christine, and did stuff online.
Moo...
Dice Roll of the Day: 6 + 2 = 8
So frustrating... maybe I should just give up?
Good Night.
Saturday, April 10, 2004--I have some
addendums to Thursday's entry.
Other than that, I went to the Eggster thing, and worked at the booth where little kids get to make their own Solar System. Kind of boring, though, but the 3 hours went by pretty fast... although I was actually 30 minutes late.
Then, I typed up some stuff for
Avalanche Online.
I'm still waiting for ANBU to put out their good version of Naruto.
That is all! Good Night!
Dice Roll of the Day: 3 + 4 = 7
Friday, April 9, 2004--I woke up and did my Physics 7C Problem Set... and that's about it, actually.
Yeah, I skipped CS61B Discussion because it's early in the morning, I'm tired, and it usually doesn't help anyway.
CS61B Lecture... Quick Sort... is very quick!
Prof Shewchuk: Quick sort was invented by a man named Tony Hoare.
*someone snickers*
Prof Shewchuk: Yes, that is an unfortunate last name, but what are you going to do about it?
*class laughs*
I went to the card shop and bought some cards for my
Arcbound deck, but I forgot to buy
mana. Oh well. I'll get some next time around.
Dice Roll of the Day: 4 + 6 = 10
Hmm... strange... if you're wounded to the same spot over and over again--a physical wound--eventually, you get a callous there, and it doesn't hurt so much when it gets pricked anymore. Does the same apply with the heart?
Good Night!
Thursday, April 8, 2004--Happy Birthday to Bernard Liang...
I'm having trouble waking up in the morning, thanks to Daylight Savings Time. I woke up at 8 instead of 7 today, so I missed my Physics 7C lecture.
Then, I went to the EE40 Lecture, where I was able stay awake for long enough to see every single slide! ...although I didn't hear every word the Prof said, but yeah, I saw every single slide. That's an achievement!
Math 55 Lecture... I leave early so I can drop off my EE40 Homework before Cory Hall locks their doors.
History 160... Wow, that was a
short history lecture today!
Then, I went to the Eggster thingie, which started 15 minutes late because people showed up late and finished 5 minutes early because it was short.
Then, I went to an HKN Bridge meeting, which we promptly ditched (including Kun, who called the meeting) to go to the HKN Telebears Peer Advising and thieve some pizza... at which I saw Melo. Hello Melo!
Then, I came back to my room and generally slacked off even though I should be doing my Physics Homework. *shrig*
Today, Coach Lee showed up at fencing in a dress. Apparently, she had to go to a fundraising dinner with the Chancellor, Maxine Hong Kingston (or whatever the hell her name is), some politically important figure, etc etc, so she although she had some clothes to change into, she didn't bring any of her gear. It was amusing.
Me: You're not planning on fencing in that are you?
Dice Roll of the Day: 3 + 4 = 7
Anyways, apparently, on Thursday, Lily Nieh was at Berkeley and in my EE40 class, just visiting, and
I didn't ever notice! Then, she went to Unit 1, 6th floor of some tower. LOL... what a strange coincidence.
Hmm... my next poll: "Is it wrong for a guy to go after a girl who is older than himself?"
Good Night!
Wednesday, April 7, 2004--Today, I woke up late and went to my CS61B Lab late and as a result didn't finish, but at least I still got 3 out of 4 points.
Math 55 Discussion... I finished the homework in 45 minutes.
Then, I spent an hour looking for Gastpar's non-existent office. Damn! Oh, well, I'll just go to the group session.
I finished the CS Homework in just 2 hours. It was surprisingly short.
CS61B Lecture...
Dice Roll of the Day: 1 + 4 = 5
A Year Ago Today: Connie Chu...
I have things to do. Good Night!
Tuesday, April 6, 2004--Currently Listening to:
For Rachel from Final Fantasy 6
Skipped Physics 7C Lecture today to get more sleep...
At the student store, I ran into Diana, whom I haven't seen in a while. She's the Cog Sci major who dropped out of CS61B in favor or some other class.
EE40 Lecture... saw Kyrin sleeping... did my Prelab...
EE40 Lab... our TA again did not show up this week... we gave our best effort and had a pretty good lab report.
Had lunch at the Terrace for the first time. Tacos are decent, but taste like DC food... except hella more expensive.
Mudterm 1 Math 55... It started at 2pm, and at about 3pm, when I was done with 3 of the 4 problems, I started falling asleep. So in my head, I told myself, "Oh shit! I'd better finish this fast if I want to be able to stay awake through the History midterm!" So I finished it up fast and just left. It was easy... too easy. A double-induction proof, counting, a weird modular Chinese Remainder Theorem type thing, and a pigeonhole principle thing...
So I sleep just outside the room and wake up at 3:30pm, just in time for History. Then, I stepped outside for some fresh air and on my way in, I ran into Daisy... literally, I collided with her. Whoops. At least it was Daisy and not some random person I didn't know.
Mudterm 2 History 160... it wasn't so bad. I was satisfied with most of my answers. What was most surprising was that when it was all over, I didn't even feel the slightest bit mentally fatigued.
I had a one-hour break. Hungry? Why wait? Grab a Snickers!
Mudterm 3 Physics 7C... this was the bad one. I solved 3 of the 5 problems (only 4 required) near perfectly (if not absolutely perfectly). However, problem #1 (one of the problems I didn't get) was apparently covered at the review section, and I couldn't solve it. Of course, it wasn't so much a problem of me not knowing how to do it. It was more like the conventions were reversed from what I had expected, so I set the thing to one instead of zero and got sin^2 + cos^2 = 0. What the hell?
Oh well, with my hella good score on the first Physics midterm, on average, I should still have a solid A in the class... unless Battaglia grades easy and the curve is like, 90% A like in high school... which would be messed.
Then, I went to Tau Beta Pi's Mafia Night. During my second game, because I was eating chips, they suspected me. Of course, it was the mafia dude Phil that accused me and convinced everyone else to kill me. Oh well. It was quite a drama that played out. First, they tried to kill this one guy, who then revealed himself to be a cop and revealed that Dude A was innocent. Then, Phil says, "I think Chippy (referring to me eating chips) over there seems suspicious, like he's trying to cover something up." Me: "It seems to me like you're accusing me of being Mafia because I'm hungry, and I think that's just ridiculous." Dude B: "All right, let's kill Dwayne, but if he turns out to be innocent, one of you [Phil or Zach] are going down!" I turn out to be innocent. Overnight, the Mafia kill Zach. The next day, Dude B gets everyone to kill off Phil, and one of the poeple who voted to kill off Phil was Quiet Girl, who was a mafia. The mafia has turned on each other! Then, as the Quiet Girl was mafia alone, she killed off the Innocent Dude (smart move!), and then it was Dude B, Frantic Girl, and Quiet Girl left. Dude B said that Frantic Girl must be the mafia because she's frantically trying to defend herself, like how a mafia would. So he and Quiet Girl kill off Frantic girl, and mafia wins. It was very tense at the end...
Then, I come back to my dorm and slack off. Ahh...
Hey, I feel
much better now! Maybe it's the music...
Dice Roll of the Day: 5 + 5 = 10
*sigh* Good Night...
Monday, April 5, 2004--My excuse for not posting today was because I was too busy reviewing for my mudterms, particularly the History 160 mudterm, because it's all essays and I suck at essays.
Math 55 Discussion... Chinese Remainder Theorem...
Physics 7C Discussion...
Skipped EE40 Discussion...
CS61B Lecture...
Then, I went to Eta Kappa Nu's Video Game Night, even though I have 3 mudterms to study for tomorrow. That's how much I love... video games!
I also watched people play Halo, Starcraft, Mario Kart Double Dash, (although no one wants to play Battle Mode... Battle Mode is the only fun part of Mario Kart!) and I had Bomberman group going for quite a long time.
Boring day. Next!
Dice Roll of the Day: 1 + 2 = 3
Good Night...
Sunday, April 4, 2004 - Addendum--I'm tired...
After she got mad at me, today just seemed... so... pointless. Yes, this journal is two days late (maybe even more if I don't actually finish this). I don't care.
Sometimes I have to ask myself, is it really worth the effort? If there was something that was so important to you, that if you could only have it, you could be happy for the rest of your life? What if this one thing was locked away, just barely out of reach, and in order to get to it, you needed to pass through a dark void, bringing only the cold and the emptiness. Would you still reach for it anyway?
Happiness can be so evasive sometimes. It cannot be approached from some angles, and sometimes, it cannot be approached at all. Other times, the path may seem perfectly clear, and yet, there's a surprise, waiting to sting you when you try.
It's like a mouse seeking a piece of cheese, but then, he steps into a mouse trap, which bites into his foot, and it hurts. Then, he runs away, and he's too scared to come back for a while. How many times would you step into that mousetrap before deciding the cheese wasn't worth it?
There is a wound in my heart, a wound that never heals. It took many people to cut it so deep, one after another. It's an ugly, jagged wound, because everyone cuts at a slightly different angle, but it's still the same cut, the same debilitating stroke. To this day, it still bleeds.
Sometimes, I feel the pain. It's a pain so powerful that I it becomes too strong for me to bear alone, and I want someone else to bear it for me. Sometimes, I want to return the pain to those who first dealt it to me, but no matter what I do, it still feels like they haven't suffered enough, for how much they have hurt me.
My hatred still resides within me. It never left. It has only been covered up by layers of optimism and hope. What are optimism and hope? Are they just ideals? Frivolous virtues invented by the naive who believe the world is good? Is the world good? Or is it, as many have observed, full of suffering, through which there is no escape.
I suffer, there is no doubt about that, but I manage. It's only through hope and optimism, that I manage. I am a dreamer. I feed on dreams, thrive on desire, survive on hope and optimism. I reach for my dreams not because I want to, but because I have to. Happiness may be just barely out of reach, but as long as I have my hope and my optimism, existence will suffice.
But what happens when she, with a single stroke, tears away my dreams and my hope?
There is always the hatred, at the core of my soul. I don't want to hate you, but I'm breaking down. The dreams tell me so...
. . . . . .
I'm sorry, I really am. I never wanted to hurt you, frustrate you, irritate you. Yes, I do respect you, I really do. I always wanted the best for the both of us...
. . . . . .
Now, to mundane matters... why do I even bother? Do people here really care that I was studying my History 160? Do people really care that I was thinking about her just before seeing her on the street?
Yes, I did see her on the street right after I thought about meeting her on the street. It was strange, as though fate summoned her to me, as though my thoughts were prophecy.
Me: Hello... I was just [thinking about you]... hello...
Her: ...hi...
Me: [doesn't actually remember her saying hi]
Strange prophecy it is... she was already mad at me when I ran into her, and I was... completely oblivious...
Me: Should a guy take what a girl says at face value and trust her words? Or should he read between the lines and try to find the hidden meanings?
Jen & Tiffany: Read between the lines. A girl will never tell you straight up what she's feeling.
Obviously our fated meeting did not help my image in her eyes...
On a lighter note, I had dinner with Joyce. She and I went to this Japanese place on North side. I had Tempura Udon. Soba is still better, though. Then, I tried to play the piano for her, but the Foothill piano was disgustingly out of tune. When I hit those notes, it was just... blech... and I couldn't play anymore, not on that piano. Too bad most songs I know hit one of those 3 or so notes.
Dice Roll of the Day: 1 + 1 = 2
Good Night...
Sunday, April 4, 2004--[removed]
"Love is like a rhino, short-sighted and hasty; if it cannot find a way, it will make a way."
--Flavor text from MTG card,
Crash of Rhinos
Saturday, April 3, 2004--Today, I went to the Tau Beta Pi E-futures. They talked about how to run a Meeting. Yes, it was a meeting about meetings. One of the highlights of the E-futures session was we did the Space Survival thing, where we had to rank the usefulness of 15 items. I always rank propulsion high and food low.
Then, I went to the Eta Kappa Nu Potluck. I asked Daisy whether she liked HKN or TBP better. She said TBP, but only because she joined TBP first... which is kind of interesting, because TBP has tougher requirements than HKN.
Then, I came back, where I challenged Bernard to an MTG duel and played my Arcbound deck against him. In the first game, he used a Reanimator deck, which had trouble getting started, apparently. I ended up killing his
Hypnox three times and ended up with a 9/9
Arcbound Stinger. A turn later, I had the 9/9 Stinger, two
Arcbound Crushers--one 6/6, one 2/2. He had a
Visara and two
Nether Spirits. So I
Shrapnel Blasted his Visara, sacrificing my Stinger and putting the counters on the smaller Crusher. Immediately, Bernard forfeits.
In the second game, Bernard used a Counter deck, but he was mana flooded. He was able to hold me off for a while, though. However, when he was down to 10 Life, I had two 1/1
Arcbound Workers and a
Discipple of the Vault. Bernard's at 10, so I Shrapnel Blasted one of my Arcbounds on him, and thanks to the Disciple, he goes down to 4. Next turn, I attack with the Disciple and the Worker, but he bounces them both with
Aether Burst. So, I replay the Disciple and the Worker. Then, I Shrapnel Blast the other Worker, but Bernard
Syncopated it, but since I the Disciple's ability still went in and knocked him down to 3. Then, I played another Worker. Bernard plays a
Scalpelexis, which means he's got a blocker I can't break. However, he doesn't want to attack, since I could kill him in 3 turns with the Arcbound Worker. Then, I play a Crusher. He does nothing. I play a
Skullclamp, which brings my Crusher up to 2/2. I Clamp the Crusher into a 3/1, then attack with the Crusher and the 1/1 Worker. Bernard, at 3 Life, blocks the Crusher with his Scalpelexis, because he doesn't want to die. However, in doing so, the Crusher dies, and the Disciple knocks off another life, bringing him to 2. The Worker deals 1 combat damage, bringing him to 1. Then, with the Crusher dead, I
choose not to give the counters to the Worker (it says "you may"). Then, I Clamp the Worker, killing it, and Disciple kills Bernard. It's the most amusing way I've seen anyone use the Skullclamp and the Arcbounds.
Anyways,
Dice Roll of the Day: 3 + 2 = 5
Good Night!
Friday, April 2, 2004--Okay, the answers to "What pranks were pulled yesterday?" are as follows:
In the
About me section, I wrote:
Current Academic Goal: Planning to transfer to the University of Edo in Japan, where they have a world-famous curriculum in Artificial Intelligence. Progress? I've already been accepted.
Current Romantic Goal: Having already slept with Kara Telani, I'm become bored of her. I'm currently trying to ditch her to get some from Kim Hung on the 7th floor. Progress? Well, I've gotten Kim to fall for my charms, but Kara just doesn't get the hint that I don't want her anymore
Current Spiritual Goal: Trying to become God. Progress? I've already closed the agreement with Prof Lucifer. I just need to write him a check for $666 dollars.
This should have been obvious, since there is no University of Edo (at least, not one that's world famous). Also, Kara Telani does not exist, nor does Prof Lucifer.
I also wrote:
For an update to the romantic scene, I'd like to tell you about my girlfriend Kara. She's a white girl, kinda short, ridiculously cute, loves to party, and she's just as smart as me! Man, who would ever have thought that I'd find such a perfect girl at Berkeley EECS? Kara, if you're reading this, I want you to know that I love you always!
Same as above, Kara does not exist.
Also, the poll was obviously a prank. I would never make a poll like that (and no, I don't lust after girls, I court them). That and Fiona Rasz is also fake.
On the
Front page I switched around the words so it said "
what I am and
who I do" instead of "who I am and what I do".
Anyways, I was tired last night, so I didn't wake up for today's CS61B Discussion...
Physics 7C Lab... it was quick.
I wanted to do the booster draft at Games of Berkeley, but since it starts at 5pm (and so does CS61B Lecture), I had to ditch lecture... so I did. Right after lab, headed straight for Games of Berkeley.
First, I bought the cards necessary to complete my Sliver deck... at least as many as I could find. The store didn't have all of them, but their commons were uber-cheap!
Then, I booster drafted. It was Mirrodin-Mirrodin-Darksteel. The first pack I opened had a crappy rare, so I drafted Domineer instead, which set me down into the path for blue. I ended up drafting lots of blue affinity cards... and very few artifacts. Whoops.
On my second booster, I opened it, looked at the rare, and gasped in shock.
Mindslaver! I immediately drafted it without looking at any of the other cards.
That day, I ended up drafting a Blue-Black deck. Then, while I was trying to build it, the tournament was about to start. Dave asked if everyone was done building their deck, and I said "I need to cut out 1 card". So Eric says he'll help, and he goes through my deck and changes stuff. Apparently, he made improvements.
My first game was against a guy named Pacman (or at least, that's what the paperwork said). Apparently, despite all the red he had gotten, he had built his deck wrong (or something like that), so I quickly beat him two for two. One of the highlights was that I used Mindslaver. Then, I spent his
Consume Spirit for zero. (Eric: "What the hell? Why would you want to do that?" Pacman: "I got Mindslaver'ed.") Then, I wasted whatever spells that I could. Another highlight was when he played a creature, equipped it with
Leonin Scimitar, and then tried to equip it with
Skullclamp. In response, I
Essence Drain'ed his creature, and he got to draw no cards. Later, he got out a
Myr Adapter, equipped it with Scimitar and Skullclamp. Then, I
Domineer'ed the Adapter and killed him with it.
In the second round, I played Eric, whom apparently is really good at the game. He beat me with
Spire Golems and his
Crystal Shard, which allowed him to rescue his creatures from my removal. However, I did get to Mindslaver him. Then, I made his
Alpha Myr equip itself with the
Viridian Longbow and shoot itself to death. Then, I had his
Leaden Myr attack and suicide into my
Omega Myr. Then, I used his Crystal Shards to bounce his own Spire Golem, just for fun. But then, the fun ended, and he recovered and beat me after that. However, he did say that Mindslaver was a good card and that it had set him back 2 turns. (Of course, when you take over the other player for a turn, how Mindslaver
not set a guy back.)
In my third game, I had to face my friend William, who apparently drafted a really good Green-White deck. His
Leonin Abunas powering up his
Tangle Golems and
Razor Golems, making them untargetable, so I couldn't remove them. I died pretty quickly.
For those of you who are interested, my draft deck looked like this:
8 Swamp
8 Island
Talisman of Dominance
Gold Myr
2 Essence Drain
2 Thoughtcast
Regress
Chromatic Sphere
2 Omega Myr
2 Arcbound Worker
Moriok Scavenger
Nim Shrieker
2 Drill-Skimmer
Scavenging Scarab
Domineer
Alpha Myr
Cobalt Golem
Annul
Slith Bloodletter
Irradiate
Mindslaver
Heh, apparently, I am a DCI-registered player, now. The guy running the draft gave me the forms to fill out and the DCI Membership card.
On my way out, I bought 3 Darksteel boosters. I opened the first one and got a
Shield of Kaldra. It's worth $2, but I was really happy since it's a Legendary artifact, and I like Legends. (Incidentally, so is Mindslaver, which means I got
two Legendary Artifacts today.) In my second pack, I got the
ARCBOUND RAVAGER!!! This is the
best Arcbound, and it's worth $22, and is the #1 wanted card on
FindMagicCards.com. In my third booster, I got a
Pristine Angel worth $6 and a foil
Arcbound Crusher which is worth $2. All in all, I got tons of good cards from my boosters today, which makes me very happy! Now, when my brother tells me to build a deck other than my Sliver deck, I can actually build something decent now!
Anyway, I came back home, updated some stuff online, and went to sleep. Good Night!
Dice Roll of the Day: 4 + 1 = 5
Thursday, April 1, 2004--Wow, I woke up really refreshed today. It probably has something to do with how I finished the CS Project last night, so that I could rest easy today.
A Year Ago Today: I ask Connie Chu out to the Senior Ball and she happily says yes.
Anyways, today, I actually showed up
early to Physics 7C Lecture today... Heh, Quantum Mechanics is fun. Did you know that the Universe was
randomly created when a particle called the Alphon was spontaneously generated, then impacted with another spontaneously generated particle called the Omegon which caused a cataclysmic explosion that we know as the Big Bang. Heh, apparently, Alphons and Omegons are generated and disappeared all the time in the Universe, but the odds of two existing close enough so to interact is very slim, and the odds of one of them being able to penetrate the gravitic field of the other (the Omegon has anti-mass, so it's anti-gravitic) is also very slim. It turns out, a Big Bang can only happen once every trillion years or so, which is much longer than the expected age of the Universe.
EE40 Lecture... Ugh... Circuitry. Why am I an Electrical Engineer again?
After that was the History 160 Lecture... Heh, apparently, in 1927, the head of the Federal Reserve (the 1920s version of Alan Greenspan) dropped dead of a heart attack, and 2 years later, the world fell into the Great Depression. Doesn't that just suck?
Then, I decided to check out the card shops at Berkeley West side. Games of Berkeley, like William said. It's a nice store. I was able to buy most of the singles I needed for my Sliver deck. (Not
Lightning Bolts, though. Those things are so old and so popular among Type 1 fanatics that they sold out so fast. But I did find this one deal that was simply too good to pass up.
Morphling for $20!!! That might
sound expensive, but it's one hell of a good deal for the single most power creature ever printed in all of MTG. So obviously, I bought one.
Dice Roll of the Day: 6 + 6 = 12
Oh, I'm also starting to learn how to play Dungeons & Dragons. I bought a book from Games of Berkeley. It seems very interesting. AIM Chat rooms come with a Dice thing, so we could use that. If anyone is interested, IM me at
Viltris.
Wow, what a day indeed! It was a Good Day. Which is why I
really mean it when I say "Good Night!"
. . . . . . . . .
Happy April Fools' Day!
LOL, anyone who fell for it this year--
especially after I did a fake entry last year--is undoubtedly a fool... an
April fool. (Of course, by the time most people read my April Fools' entry, part of it had already come true, so it was highly convincing... Hmm... Maybe I should invite her to ice cream?) Anyways...
A Year Ago Today: "We're kicking butt, 2 to 2!"
For my real day, since I stayed up until
4am last night working on the CS Project (although it is indeed finally finished), so I chose not to wake up on time for my Physics and my EE Lectures today. Besides, I usually end up sleeping through them or otherwise not paying attention to them
anyway, so why bother?
So I went to lunch at the Crossroads and hung out with Steve, Irwin, and Tammy.
Me: Hey look, it's Kim! Hello Kim!
Meh... I shouldn't have done that.
Kim: Hello.
I was doing my EE homework and I couldn't even figure out the first problem, so during my
Math 55 Lecture
I asked Daisy, whom also didn't know, so Daisy asked her friend whom I didn't know who made a really good guess that I knew was a good guess. Cool!
History 160 Lecture...
After dinner was when I posted the April Fools entry. The biggest giveaway that it was a hoax should have been the fencing thing. Considering the entry was posted at 8pm and that fencing on Thursday doesn't even
start until 9:30pm, so how could I have already written an entry about it? Of course, those of you reading this late would have no way of knowing this.
Anyways, I then went fencing, and since Severin or any other advanced Saberist didn't show up, Amber and I just practiced Sabering ourselves. Apparently, if you parry to four, you can easily attack to the side of the head, and your opponent won't have time to block, only enough time to
get the hell out of the way!
Anyways, upon coming back, I decide it's time to clean up all the April Fools' jokes I dropped.
If any of you saw any of the jokes here during the 24 hour window,
e-mail me and tell me what the jokes were, and you'll get an ePrize and recognition on my website. You have until tomorrow night, when I will post the answers on my Journal.
I predict no one will respond, because my readership is illusionary. Heh, but we all know that I write this Journal mainly for myself, although I'm sure others are occasionally entertained by it.
Anyways, here's the
real Dice Roll of the Day: 1 + 4 = 5
This last part is no joke. I want to become god. That is my ultimate goal in life.
Good Night!