escape to insanity

Well, with just a few hours left in 2005… I figured I'd take a minute or two to recap the events of this year. It's been a fun and fairly eventful year all in all.

• Began my last year of college
• Moved out of the dorms and into a house of my own (sorta)
• Started this website
• Became a fairly prolific writer on here
• Learned ASP and PHP
• Got closer to a few of my real friends
• Managed to keep a secret for a few months before taking a chance on revealing it with as yet unknown results :p
• Found out I'm like an onion. Or a biscuit. How about a parfait? Everybody loves parfaits… parfaits are delicious.
• Bought an iPod
• Became a staff member at BigBlueBall.com
• and much more that I can't really recall at the moment.

So there's been a lot. And that's just what happened to me personally… it's been a busy year in politics, in world events, etc. With that, I want to wish everyone a very happy and safe New Year's Eve. Have fun and enjoy yourselves. Here's to 2006.

And now, I'm heading out for the evening with friends. See you all next year.

I count him braver who overcomes his desires than him who conquers his enemies; for the hardest victory is over self.

- Aristotle, courtesy of Kate

Ahh, the things I do for women. Today after I got out of work (at 3pm - short hours just before the holiday), I get a phone call from what sounds like four frantic girls. Yep, tis true. Girls do in fact call me occasionally. Shocking. Anyway… my female friends somehow decided amongst themselves that they wanted to buy pick out some new clothes for me to wear when we all go out for new year's eve. Why? Who knows… the female mind is a complex thing that no one really understands.

So we eventually end up at Aeropostale. That store is unbelievably ridiculous preppy. It's one of those stores where you'd think they have a requirement that you be carrying a skateboard and have a sweater around your waist to be able to enter. No sooner do we get in the store than the girls start throwing clothes at me and shove escort me into a dressing room. I suppose the term “room” is used fairly loosely there - felt much more like a closet than a room. They start almost barking commands at me, something along the lines of “let's see you try on those jeans with that shirt under that jacket nnnnmmmmmmrrrrrrzzzzz.” That's about where I couldn't understand their babbling anymore. You try clothes-shopping with four girls and see how well you do.

So I comply as best as I can as quickly as I can to avoid certain death. I manage to shove myself into the clothes they wanted, and then open the door for the show. Do the spin, lift the shirt some, spin around again, consult the mirror, ask the people waiting for the person in the next dressing closet room, etc. Then repeat with a different set of clothes. Ugh. Shopping is so much fun.

I end up being conned into convinced to buy a pair of nice khaki cargo pants and some kind of light jacket thing. I honestly dont know what to call this thing. A shacket? A jirt? It's not really either one of them. Jill claims it's a “casual polyester jacket” or, my favorite, “a fashionable jacket.” Clearly, she must have misspoken; she must have meant “impractical.” A common error. Really, I'm just a nice-jeans-and-a-comfortable-sweatshirt kind of guy. But I guess I look decent in these things. Apologies for the shoddy photo work… the camera wouldn't hold still in a position I could get the whole picture in. I'll have a better picture after New Years' Eve.

The important thing is that there were four girls (whose opinion on clothing I guess I respect) all drooling over me in these ridiculous amazing clothes. That was fun. Gotta love being the object of admiration for at least three single girls (one of them is already married and out of my age range anyway), as well as the few girls that were passing by the area and caught the show. Fun times.

So yeah. This ended up being one of those “here's what I did today” posts that I hate so much, but it was a fun(ny) experience that I felt like sharing. I definitely needed to have a good time after the week I've been having thus far. Ahh, women and the things I do for them.

Is a person's music collection a reflection of their thoughts, or an influence on their thoughts? I've been mulling over this for a couple days and can't seem to make up my mind(s) about it.

- Just a Thought from Careless Thought

(Leave any comments on this at that site please… it's her material, not mine)

I thought this was a rather intriguing thought. My response was that I think it's both. Your music influences your thoughts, especially when you add new music that you haven't heard before; it also reflects your thoughts, in that the music you most like tends to mean something to you in some way. Interesting…

Facebook-CIA conspiracy?

Stop and think about Facebook for one minute. A 21-year-old Harvard student starts a networking site for college students, and now there are over 5 million users, many of which have probably never looked at the Privacy Policy. After all, Facebook is fun, so they freely post their name, address, school, concentration, political affiliation, friends, plans and even photos in which faces are linked to profiles.

- Continue reading What Would Orwell Do?

Ahh, the holidays. I realize this post comes late on Christmas night, but that's ok. I don't mind. I considered not posting anything for today, but I have nothing else to do at the moment so why not.

Usually I don't like this time of year. It's cold, it snows, and it's cold. Plus, there's a big heap of holidays that everyone gets all flustered over. Thanksgiving becomes this big rush for turkey, and everyone forgets that it's thanks-giving day. Then, if that weren't bad enough, Thanksgiving has become Christmas Part 1. The radio stations switch their playlists to 100% Christmas music a month in advance of Christmas. Who really wants to hear Christmas music 24 hours a day for a month? Especially when it means the stations have to fill their playlists with all sorts of ridiculous covers.

Also, Christmas as a holiday has become far too commercialized for my tastes. Many people have forgotten the true reason for and meaning of Christmas, and now see it as just a holiday that means going to stores and buying people gifts, then spending a morning ripping the paper off of their own presents. That's not what Christmas is about. It's about the birth of Christ. Hence the name of the whole holiday.

Anyway, as far as the commercial aspect of Christmas, I did fairly well this year. I didn't ask for much, really. I had a pretty simple list of music and movies, with some assorted other requests thrown in for the sake of variety. Even so, my family found some creative gifts. At the risk of making a list of some of it, I got:

• a really nice furry blanket with a picture of two white tigers on it (pictures to follow when I get access to the camera)
• a heated mattress pad, to keep my bed warm (I like warm beds…)
• some great movies - Jack Ryan 3-pack, The Rock, and The Bourne Collection
• two awesome CDs - Coldplay's “Parachutes” and Anberlin's “Never Take Friendship Personal”
• a new belt-watch
• gift certificates & money

All in all, it was a pretty good year. A few things need to be returned/exchanged, but that's to be expected. Besides, by returning a few of the duplicate gifts, I get to get my absolute favorite album, which somehow I've managed to not get yet. Plus, I managed to do pretty well on the giving, my family is generally happy with their gifts, with some minor returns/exchanges.

Anyway, now that I've done the obligatory Christmas post, I'm gonna go clean up this mess and put in one of my new movies.

Have you ever had a dream, Neo, that you were so sure was real? What if you were unable to wake from that dream? How would you know the difference between the dream world and the real world?

- Morpheus, in the Matrix

I had a terrific dream last night. It was one of those dreams that you desperately want to stay in, but your alarm clock just won't let you. One of those dreams where you dread waking up from, because you know real life won't be as good. This was one of those dreams where the moment you wake up, you wish with all your being that it would be true instead of just a simple dream. This dream was close enough to reality that I couldn't tell the difference until my alarm clock went off. Believe me, I was very pleasantly surprised by the events in my dream (no, I won't go into details, it's unnecessary), and then very unpleasantly awakened by the intrusion of a loud beeping noise that came out of nowhere. I really wish my real life was the way it was in my dream. Things would be so much nicer and happier that way.

Most of the time my dreams are so much better than the real world. In my dreams I'm happy. Luckily, I can still remember most of my dream, and that means I can go back to it at will. Believe me, this is one dream I'll be revisiting as often as I can.

So of course the only time you really think about this is when you are watching “It's a Wonderful Life”. Then I think “What would life be like, without me?” And I really do start to think about it.

- MrEggsalad posed an interesting question on his site recently. What would the world be like without you in it? That question does actually get you thinking. What would life be like for everyone if you didn't exist? How would their lives change? Would they change?

I'd like to think people's lives would be different without me around. My friends might not have the nice guy to go to with their problems or their stories. My parents would have had an empty nest long ago. I'd like to think lots would change.

What would the world be like without you?

So, I'm home for an entire month. That means I have to find something to keep myself occupied for that length of time. Obviously I'll be working a good chunk of the time, but what to do in my “spare” time?

I need to go through my stuff and get rid of the stuff I know I don't use. I have so many shirts I don't wear but am hesitant to get rid of because “I might wear that.” Well… that doesn't cut it. Time to toss some of those. I have a lot of stuff like that, where it gets no use but I don't want to rid myself of it. No idea why. I guess I'm a packrat at heart. Can't do that anymore.

I need to get some books to read. I wanna try reading some of the books on the Geek Novel list, but I also have some more eclectic reading planned. I want to try to read Machiavelli's The Prince, maybe SunTzu's Art of War, etc. Maybe a few more Neal Stephenson books… I started A Winter Haunting but only got partway into the first chapter before I had to come back home. Maybe I'll keep going with Neuromancer, another book I had to stop reading because the semester ended and I had to return it to the library. So many choices. I'm willing to consider others too, if you have recommendations.

I want to expand my music collection too. I've been slowly and steadily building my collection, but there's always room for more. And not just more stuff by the same artists that I already have and like, but more stuff by more artists.

I need to start seriously job-hunting for after graduation. Trouble is my full-time job kinda gets in the way of that. I'll have to talk to my manager to see if I can negotiate some kind of alternate work system, maybe four days a week instead of five, although that'll seriously cut into my cash flow. If anyone's looking for a soon-to-be-graduating budding web designer with a degree in Management (emphasis on Marketing, also a minor in Business Psychology), I'm your man. Get in touch.

I just need something to keep my mind and body active for the next month. Otherwise I end up sitting here in this chair scouring the internet for the newest joke, or an entertaining blog entry, or posting here about anything that crosses my bored little mind.

Yep, tis true what you probably haven't heard. I am back home for winter break. No classes, papers, exams, presentations, groups, or professors for a month. Ain't it grand? Yep. Of course, instead of getting up as early as 8am for class, I get to get up at 7am for work. Lovely trade off. Except I get paid to be at work. Works for me, since I'm poor and need the money.

If you're in the area, especially if you're in the area and are female, be sure to make good use of the break and get in as much Tom time as possible. Limited time offer.