Dr. Memnus Lagbane Soultooth the Mad

Wow, where to start. I suppose there's only one reasonable place.

Katy and Cal are married. This is awesome.

Friday turned out to not be the airline day from hell after all. My trip was shaved by six hours when US Airways got me on a direct flight to Boston, once it became apparent that I would not make it to Portland in time to leave Portland. I was therefore in Boston in time for dinner - I and my gracious hosts met up with Conor and Nik(k)i to hunt for cheap food; it was, in fact, found. After much frantic phone dancing, Frances finally heard that I'd make it to Boston ahead of her, so Dan and I stayed up until we went out to the airport to get her.

Saturday, the picnic, as well as all that hanging out with people I haven't seen in far, far too long... I know I didn't gt the chance to catch anyone; I also know that I tend to squander such chances even when I do get them. But it was great to see everyone, and meet new people! This also comes with a major note-to-self to add the greater Boston area to the list of places that I should keep in mind for the future.

Sunday, a bit more (unstructured) hanging out, and the ceremony and reception. The ceremony was short and beautifully touching. The reception (and transition thereto) was well planned and orchestrated, unlike a certain previous wedding I attended, and just... fit. Guests seemed to be equally balanced between "friends" and "family", which is just as well, because within the former group there could be difficulties separating a bride's side from a groom's side. I imagine others will wax more eloquent, but the entire event couldn't have been better. That, and Benj makes an amazing MC.

(Etc.)

Today was the first day in recent memory that I managed to take a flight with everything going exactly as planned! The fact that this is noteworthy is somewhat distressing, but at this point I'll take what I can get. It is annoying, however, that one of my personal symptoms of sleep deprivation (I slept all of two hours last night) is mild nausea, and the landing in SLC was bumpier than usual. Now we actually have campaign for the first time this month, too. Weird.

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Received today:

Dear Brian,

I'd like to extend a personal invitation to you for the School of Computing Graduation Party, which will be held Friday, May 2nd at 1pm following graduation. You'll be receiving an award, which will be presented at about 2pm, so please don't miss this chance to celebrate your accomplishments. I look forward to congratulating you in person on Friday.

(name)

Thanks for giving me more than, you know, a day's warning. In related news, I finished the semester on Tuesday, and I'm now in Claremont, just chilling. The week promises much shooting (if I get the keys from Coach Town, and get off my ass to go out) and much hanging out with awesome people (yay senior dead week).

Results from regionals are out - I did in fact take second in the FITA, with the best 70m and 50m scores in the division. My new goal is to clean up my act at 90m - if I can manage that, and stay on top of my game, I'll be a serious competitor at USIACs - looking at a chance of placing, not just showing up. (Speaking of, if anyone in Claremont has a washer or two (yes, the round metal kind) that I can have, I'd appreciate it.)

Really, that's about all I have to say at the moment. Looking forward to some serious destressing, and knowing the worst is over as far as grad school is concerned.

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Tournament report: 2007 CAP Western Regional Championships
STAR FITA + individual ORs

I went into this tournament on two days of practice - that is not an exaggeration. New arrows, new form, both only tested outside the Sunday and Tuesday preceeding the competition. So I wasn't expecting much.

The first day, I began to realize I needed to set my standards a bit higher. A forty-point improvement at 90m from my old usual, to 241, was nothing compared to the shock of shooting a 298 at 70m - a score which would turn out to be the best in my division. Only 90 was leaving me 40 points behind.

The day was hot as hell, and as we tried to get ready for the team ORs a dust storm blew in, causing a declaration of "unsafe conditions" (ie targets falling over) and we were done for the day. The day after was a bit less hot, and a bit more humid, and the second-place shooter dropped out for heat exhaustion, leaving me in a very unfamiliar position: chasing a medal. I knocked in extremely solid showings at 50m and 30m - 292 and 329 respectively - for a total of 1160, I believe second place.

At this point it was getting extremely late, because the team ORs had been moved to Sunday morning and the actual scoring hadn't started until nearly 11. Individual ORs didn't start until 4... and dragged on and on, as they tried to line up a field of newbies on not enough targets... and my 7:30 flight loomed closer and closer. At the clock rolled past 5, the sun started to set, and suddenly I found myself at a serious disadvantage as a left-handed archer. The sun was dropping quickly in front of me and behind everyone else on the line. My scores started to show it, and though I never embarassed myself, I was knocked from my #4 seed in the semifinals. (I'll give you one guess as to by how many points. Weird.)

The time was then 6:10, and I decided to go for it. Giving my regrets to the TD, I headed for the car, changed my shirt, and booked it back to the airport. If I'd known the route a bit better I might have made it; as it was, my flight to SLC was closed with no open seats on later ones. The remaining option, other than the 7:15 flight the next morning (infeasible, given the 6 AM meeting I have) leads me to where I am now - a layover in Vegas, getting me home by, uh, 2:30 in theory. In fact, it's a "potential oversold situation" which would just be the icing on the cake. All this, just to get stuck in Vegas with only a laptop, a stretch band, and eight people counting on seeing me tomorrow.

To summarize: Take anything you'd devote two entire days to that would leave you no energy for anything else. Move 15% of that thing from day one to day two. Once all that's done, get only two hours of sleep before going back to work. That's how exhausted I'm going to be tomorrow... for now I'm still running on adrenaline fumes.

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I have hardly any attention span right now - I'm waiting for campaign to start, have laundry in the dryer, two different Google searches up, and the .tex of my geo paper open - and I imagine this entry will reflect that.

Dear DangKid,

You're in CS 2, and your girlfriend is in CS 1 - it's really sweet that you help her with her homework. Really, it is. However, we spend a LOT of time on the differences between arrays and linked lists. While that is new material in CS 1, you should probably know it by now, rather than coming to ask me about it.

No skin of my back,
Your TA


Dear NewEgg,

I realize not all of your stock is in the same place. Even still, did you really need a box that big for just my keyboard and mouse? Seriously, I could hold an entire family of cats in there.

Actually, that'd be pretty cute.

Still no access to recycling,
Brian


( Computer questions for discussion )

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Well folks, it's time to buckle down. Most nights now I'll have something that must-get-done-before-I-go-home (tonight is the penultimate batch of grading), which is not a state I like but thank gods it's only for less than two weeks. It doesn't bode particularly well for the quality of what comes out, but uh, cope. I'm also breaking into caffiene supplies, in hopes of, you know, staying awake through class. This is a state I like even less, but after April 27th it's no stimulants until June, and after that back to the status quo which isn't all that different.

I suppose it's what I get for moving somewhere with weather: it's fucking snowing again. SNOWING. In LATE APRIL. I realize that this is what happens; I did grow up in Colorado after all. But the weather is supposed to conform to MY needs. It's supposed to be sunny now that I'm sending myself out running; it's supposed to be warm when I need to practice for a tournament in Phoenix.

My Claremont trip was fun, although somewhat clouded when my stomach decided to wake me at 5:30 Saturday morning with some extremely painful complaints, and proceed not to shut up entirely for nearly 24 hours. A good time was still had!

I'm finally comitted to going to USIACs, though perhaps a day too late. I requested the supposed hotel information, and not only is it ridiculously expensive (110/night two miles away, or 89/night 35 miles away??), but the reservation date was yesterday and the default staying nights are offset from my actual schedule by a day. So, on my own for that one. Also will have to rent a car... suck.

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So if I have a cylinder of approximate length 32 inches and diameter 1.5 inches, could I consider it alone a single checked bag? Not only is 32 inches longer than the diagonal of the allowed carryon dimensions, the contents of the cylinder are explicitly disallowed in carryon.

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Dear DangKid,

You seem to have brought a four-year-old to lab with you. I noticed this because last I checked he is not enrolled in the class and I've not received any homeworks from him. I didn't say anything because he wasn't disrupting anything, and I can only assume that you had no other choice in the matter. Still, that room has very good acoustics, and I could hear him racing his cars all around your computer.

A bit puzzled,
Your TA


Dear Elder Sister Whoever,

Did you trade all your common sense for that black nametag? Last I checked the only non-sapient animals officially allowed into banks were service animals. Yet you seem to saw fit to come in - not as a customer, that I could tell, but only to visit your daughter in her place of employment - bringing along two very young puppies. I mention their age, because I couldn't help but notice that they're not housebroken. Such things become obvious when one of said puppies decides to take a crap on the carpet.

Seriously, WTF,
Innocent Bystander

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Getting more serious about building my own computer. It'll be a similar setup to my current box, a dual-boot Windows/Linux system with media on a shared partition. I don't habitually store movies, and at current rates will never be interested in high-definition or protected Content. I rip CDs, but I don't have a problem with 128kbps MP3. I want DirectX 10 and OpenGL 2.0 support, and sometime during the lifespan of this computer I'll have the free time to take advantage of them. I would like to maximize the length of time before products start coming out that will be simply unsupported.

[Poll #956551]

Defend your answer in comments. Particularly, I'd like some alternate opinions on this scathing condemnation of Vista design decisions.

I fail at fudge, but I've come too far to be denied now. I will try again.

As soon as I get the burnt sugar off the bottom of the pan...

EDIT: Deleted previous entry. Can't leave the house after all. Fudge is a needy thing.

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So if you miss the first leg of a reservation, the entire thing gets cancelled. This is a serious problem when, say, the outbound leg of a round-trip flight turns into an unexpected drive. You also can't cancel just the outbound leg of a trip; you have to convert the flight to a one-way... which is a ridiculous $85 more expensive.

Meanwhile, archery tournaments continue to mock me. To qualify for Academic All-American, you need to finish in the top 25% of the division in National Indoors. I shot 24th out of 88, once again a scant six points out of anything useful.

I'm kinda sick of the mocking, now, ok world? Ok.

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