Kelsey-Pedia

It's the Little Things

2010-08-09T14:28:00.002-04:00

Most of the time, I miss the obvious things about MIT: my friends, challenging classes, La Verde's infinite selection of drinks, Boston's awesomeness. Every now and then, though, something little catches me off guard and I spend the rest of the day pining for the T and Sebastians sandwiches.

Today: chirping at a crosswalk.

I was biking to class, and as I was stopped at an intersection, I heard that familiar chirping noise. I was oddly disappointed when it seemed to stop short, and then I realized I wasn't standing at 77 Mass Ave, waiting to rush across four lanes to get to a class or meeting. And then I really realized I wasn't standing at 77 Mass Ave and wouldn't get to for a while (at least not as a legit MIT student).

Something To Be Excited For

2010-08-04T16:39:00.004-04:00

Howl comes out September 24th, and it's probably going to be awesome. James Franco, David Straithairn, and Jeff Daniels in a movie about Allen Ginsberg? Yes please.

Post-Scavenger Hunt

2010-08-04T16:25:00.006-04:00

A few weeks ago, some friends and I got together and had a massive scavenger hunt. When I say massive, I mean massive. Like covering 8000 square miles and taking 12+ hours massive. We had a grand total of nine people/three teams competing, and all three teams ended up driving over 400 miles each between Eugene, the coast, and around Portland.

Challenges included stops at Voodoo Doughnut in Eugene and Portland, the world's smallest park, the Oregon Coast Aquarium, sunset at Mary's Peak, and taping a package of muffins to a random street sign. Here are some photos for your viewing pleasure...

Sunset at Mary's Peak

The world's smallest park

Muffins!

Mama, Don't Take My Kodachrome Away!

2010-07-23T18:51:00.002-04:00

It always makes me sad when I learn about some type of film or another going extinct. Kodachrome couldn't have had a better send-off, though.

Last Kodachrome roll processed in Parsons

Energy

2010-07-23T18:34:00.002-04:00

It's clearly been a while... My apologies for that, everyone. I could give you a million excuses, but I'm not going to. I could also give you a lengthy update on my life, but the details even bore me. Instead, here's the short version:

Spring term sucked. I hated my classes, I passed all my classes, and I realized I want to go back to MIT.
I'm taking summer classes - physics and vector calculus. More along the lines of what I'd take at MIT, and I'm so much happier.
I have a job at a local pizza place washing dishes some nights and serving pizzas/cleaning up after people on other nights. I work weekends, which is unfortunate, but the people are awesome and the pizza's delicious.
I'm going to be on the newscrew for the National FFA Convention in October! Needless to say, I'm beyond excited.

There really haven't been any other major things going on, unless I'm forgetting something. Anyway. Expect more regular posts here! Well, hopefully. I'm toying with the idea of switching to a tumblr site that's a little less text-heavy and energy-intensive (the thought of sitting down and writing out a blog is a little boring these days), and continuing writing about focused topics on another site. I'll keep you all posted!

Take Me Back to the Tech

2010-05-03T21:13:00.003-04:00

Week six has just started here at Oregon State, which means that I've spent the last six weeks wishing I were back at MIT. Don't get me wrong, I like living in Corvallis, I love being near family and friends, and it's a nice break. Unfortunately, it's too much of a break.

My classes leave a little something to be desired. I tried to take fun classes, and to some degree they are, but they're far from intellectually stimulating. Ornithology is just a different application of really basic biology principles; Wine in the Western World lectures usually consist of our professor going off on a lot of tangents about yeast. Dendrology is interesting and very memorization-intensive, but isn't necessarily anything new to me. Continental European Literature is proving to the most difficult of my classes simply because there's a high volume of reading and lengthy class discussions where I have only minor things to contribute. I don't have homework, just a lot of reading to get through. There are a few papers coming up, however, so that should break up the monotony a little. Moral of the story: I'm bored. As much as MIT made me feel like I wasn't learning anything because it was over-the-top challenging and there was too much to do, I would take it any day over feeling this bored. Fortunately the term ends soon, and then I'll be taking a couple of classes this summer that are hopefully a bit more difficult (vector calculus and general physics with calculus).

In general, life has been pretty busy. It's just been school, sleep, cleaning my apartment, and seeing friends on occasion. I wish I had a more exciting update for all of you that still actually read this, but that's all that's been going on!

Recovery Plan

2010-03-24T20:28:00.004-04:00

Things have been surprisingly busy post-MIT. Moving to Corvallis, figuring out OSU stuff, and helping out with FFA contests has taken up a lot of time, and otherwise I'm hanging out with friends, appreciating my time at home without classes.

Oregon State took their sweet time getting back to me, and I finally deduced that I was accepted only a week and a half before the start of spring term. Fortunately I have connections and was able to register for classes before I received the official letter (which showed up at my house last night). And I could not be more excited about classes. They're not anything special, but they're such a departure from what I was taking at MIT. I'm excited for a change of pace and a chance to recover and feel intelligent again. I have a feeling I'm going to enjoy Ornithology, Wine in the Western World, and Tree and Shrub Identification. I'm going to try to take a math class, and maybe an English comp class, but a ton of classes are full so I need to find something I can get into. Regardless, with just those three classes I'm going to have a fun term.

Unfortunately, I haven't heard anything back on the job front. I've applied, so now I just get to wait... Some friends have given me some good suggestions, though, so I'm going to explore a few different options. Classes start in a mere five days, so I guess I'll see just how busy I get and go from there!

Oregon FFA's state convention was this past weekend at Oregon State. I helped judge Marketing Plans, and helped out a couple of teams. I was definitely reminded of just how much I love FFA, and how important agriculture is to me. It was very strange to be there, though, without the stress of competing, or a million things to do. Also, I wasn't in the blue corduroy jacket. Needless to say, I felt a little out of place. My advisor always hinted to me in high school that she thought I should be an ag teacher, and after this weekend, I'm definitely considering a little bit more seriously. Just another reason it's a good thing that I'm taking time off, I suppose, so I figure that out.

At the end of the day, I still miss MIT (and everyone there) a lot, and I'm not sure how long I'll be back here in Oregon. But being back in Oregon is definitely fun, relaxing, and the perfect way to recover from the stresses of MIT.

Press Conference

2010-01-30T12:00:00.001-05:00

That's right, ladies and gentlemen. That's a black turtleneck.

That's also my empty closet. In my empty room.

Empty. As in devoid of my things. Those things are now in cardboard boxes that are patiently waiting for the nice UPS employee that will be coming on Monday to pick them up and set them on their way in an epic journey across the country, toward their final destination of my family's front doorstep.

I guess I should provide some backstory. When I was first admitted to MIT, I wasn't 100% sure I wanted to come here. I was seriously considering going to Oregon State to major in something related to agriculture. But, you don't say no to MIT. So I came here, and every term was far from perfect. I loved certain things about MIT - the people, the culture, the location - but I certainly hated the academics.

This past term was especially far from perfect. Swine flu, stress and a million other factors contributed, and it was clear that this was not sustainable.

As such, I'll be taking at least a couple of terms off from MIT. My game plan is to attend Oregon State and explore majors related to botany and horticulture (definitely not options available at MIT), catch up a little, and take some time to figure out what I really want to do. It pains me, because I am going to genuinely miss my friends around campus, at WMBR and my sisters in Pi Beta Phi. Unfortunately, this seems to be the best option for me, so I can get back on my feet. Thanks to everyone who's been so supportive thus far! And thanks to Zoe and Ahmed for helping me pack this afternoon.

Steve Jobs

2010-01-29T02:16:00.002-05:00

As many of you probably know, Steve Jobs and his turtleneck that he's had surgically attached to his body got up on a stage this past Wednesday and announced that the world would have another Apple product to drool over, even though it was missing a million features normal people would want in a computer-type device because they're logical.

Steve Jobs is a smart man.

For months, geeks everywhere waited with baited breath while their Apple insider blog of choice loaded, hoping that something would pop up on their screen bearing news of a tablet computer. Everyone speculated about the possible features, some people ruthlessly kept tabs on just what Apple was buying. Steve Jobs kept everyone in suspense, so when the actual product was finally released, people were marginally okay with the fact that it doesn't even have a USB port.

I'm going to copy Steve Jobs. Well, copy is probably the wrong word. I definitely have news for you, but I'm not going to wait several months, then have a press conference. Maybe I'll wear a black turtleneck, though (I just found mine in the back of my closet today...). But I am going to tell you that I have news, and I'm posting it here on Saturday. Hell, I'll even liveblog it. Well, it's going to be a blog, so I suppose I'll have to figure out how to liveblog a blog. Anyway.

The only hints I'll give is that I'll explain the past few months of silence, and I'm not releasing iLife 2010.

News. That happens to really only be mediocre. This Saturday. Black turtleneck and everything.

Be there.

(Some of you already know the news. Don't spoil my fun. The only reason I'm waiting until Saturday is that I don't know what to write and I'm hoping I'll come up with something by then... I'm also super busy.)

50 Things I'm Thankful For

2009-11-28T05:56:00.000-05:00

I hope all of you in the US had a great Thanksgiving, and I hope that the rest of you had a good Thursday. My Thanksgiving was spent here at MIT, working on a multivariable calculus p-set, sleeping, hanging out with friends, and engorging myself on delicious food.

In honor of the spirit of Thanksgiving, here's a list of 50 things I'm thankful for right now. Clearly it is not a comprehensive list, but I hope that it can begin to make up for all of the complaining I do on this blog.

50. Strawberries.
49. Pineapple, and pineapple juice.
48. MIT FML.
47. Soup.
46. Gatorade.
45. Ibuprofen and acetaminophen.
44. MIT Medical.
43. Public transportation.
42. Sunrises.
41. Campfires.
40. Rain.
39. Post-It notes.
38. My Boston Moleskine.
37. Ikea.
36. Snow Leopard.
35. Infinite Jest and Infinite Summer.
34. Facebook.
33. Youtube.
32. Twitter.
31. Countdown with Keith Olbermann.
30. This website.
29. Not being allergic to wheat or dairy.
28. Cheese!
27. The Office.
26. My ukulele.
25. Good music and good concerts.
24. Good movies.
23. BBQs with friends.
22. Warm summer evenings.
21. Fairs and rodeos.
20. Star Trek.
19. Monty Python.
18. Girls Nights.
17. Cameras.
16. External Hard Drives.
15. E-mail.
14. Letters, postcards and packages.
13. WMBR.
12. LaundryView.
11. Airplanes and direct flights.
10. Cellphones and Skype and IM.
9. Student Support Services.
8. The food in my refrigerator.
7. Boston.
6. Oregon.
5. Pi Beta Phi.
4. Caffeine (and Starbucks and Dutch Brothers).
3. Agriculture and FFA.
2. MIT (and the fact that they still let me come here).
1. The Important People in my life. (Family, friends and this person.)

In Which I Complain a Lot

2009-11-19T21:50:00.005-05:00

Somehow I did a dandy job of picking the coldest spot to work in Rotch Library. I mean, I have a nice view of building 11, and I'm surrounded by books about the National Parks and forestry and agriculture, but I also happen to be surrounded by vents that are spewing coldness.

Working in Simmons was not working, unfortunately. There were too many distractions: my ukulele, my friends, and my largely unread copy of Infinite Jest. So instead I packed up my stuff and trekked over to Rotch Library (a location I am wishing I had discovered sooner, except for this one section that is apparently an icebox) to buckle down and work on this chemistry p-set. It's not much better than Simmons, though. There are tons of books that I could spend hours perusing, and I'm sleepy. Also, with Thanksgiving a mere week away, and my flight home only four weeks away, I find myself missing home more than usual.

I'm not heading back to Oregon for Thanksgiving, though I do wish I was. You have no idea how badly I want to see friends and family and all the people that are honestly just too far away from me for my liking. You have no idea how badly I want a Kahlua Kicker from Dutch Bros (maybe MIT could develop the magic to transport hot coffee over long distances... Course 8 people, you guys should get on that), or pizza from American Dream (why is all of the pizza in Boston so terrible and greasy?!), or any of the myriad of other things Boston just fails at having. A quick peek at Expedia's prices for flights home next week makes it a bit easier to stay here for those four days, however; a roundtrip ticket is around $1000. So instead I'll be relaxing here in Boston, working on a paper, p-sets, a presentation, and starting the studying-for-finals marathon. Oh, and I'll be sleeping a lot. I'll also be working on getting over this lingering swine flu-y cough that just won't go away. Hopefully the sleep will help with that.

My last complaint of the evening: the latest Spoon EP (Got Nuffin) is not the greatest ever. Let me just say that Spoon is one of the bands that I will unconditionally love, no matter what they produce. But Got Nuffin pushes it. The title track is legitimately good, but of the four tracks (one of which is a remix), only two are actually enjoyable to listen to. Maybe I need to give it another listen, but I was definitely less than impressed upon first listen. I'm crossing my fingers that their upcoming album (due out January 26th) is better.

... YES. The vents of iciness that are all around me are no longer trying to freeze everything in the vicinity. I think I can finally get some work done, meaning I will stop complaining.

Coming soon: MIT's Obama-madness, why I'm switching majors (SURPRISE!), and probably a lot more complaining.

Yes, I'm Still Alive

2009-11-16T01:11:00.010-05:00

So, it's been pointed out to me twice this weekend in Facebook wall posts that I haven't posted in a while.

Sorry about that.

There have a been a number of contributing factors: lack of topics, lack of time, and lack of energy. All lousy excuses, I know. So here's what's been going on over the past few months for me...

Summer
Summer was... well... awesome. I spent it with awesome people doing awesome things, which is precisely how summer should be spent. Highlights: barbeques galore, an eight mile hike, buying a ukulele, visiting fairs and rodeos, and just having fun.

MIT
I realize that this is a given. But I don't know if it's possible to convey in print just how severely MIT has been kicking my ass this term. Like, it's seriously on a level that I didn't know was possible. I do actually like one of my classes, though. My ecology class (1.018 for you MIT-ers) is amazing! The CI-M part (a term paper) can be a little obnoxious at times, but the subject material is incredibly interesting, and something I could spend hours happily working on. Physics and chemistry... well... they're a different story. Things outside of classes are keeping me busy as well. Pi Phi and the radio station take up some time, which is fine. But by the time I manage to make a dent in the amount of work I have, the last thing I want to do at the end of the day is blog. Typically I just want to sleep.

I'm actually going to be incredibly lazy right now and just post some pictures from the past few months (because, well, I want to sleeeeeeep). These are all from MIT, and the few moments I've not been studying. Enjoy!

The Cambridge side of the Charles River.
Boston's John Hancock Tower.
Boston Public Library's courtyard.
There's some construction going on in the Infinite Corridor, and these signs appeared. Naturally, MIT students had to add their commentary.
Obama paid a little visit to campus back in October. This was the car he was in (my photography skills failed me for a moment). I'll actually be posting more about this...
Girl Talk played at the Boston House of Blues earlier this month. It was one of the most epic dance-y shows I've ever been to. If you have no idea who Girl Talk is... well... you need to fix that. Go. Now. I won't be offended.
People always complain that MIT has an ugly campus. I actually have to disagree with them.
As much as I complain about being in New England, I must say there are times when I wouldn't want to be anywhere else. These moments are typically on gorgeous fall days...

So. A post! I promise you that there will never again be a four-month unannounced hiatus. And thanks Ms. Behrle and Nathan for hinting (though not so subtly) that I needed to update this.

A Cell Phone Review for the Ages: the Nokia E71x

2009-08-18T02:00:00.000-04:00

To be perfectly honest, the title of this blog probably promises more than I can deliver. Okay, not probably - definitely. Try as I might to give you the greatest review you've ever read, it simply isn't possible. I know my limits. While I know my limits, I also rarely pay attention to them. (Times I pay attention to them: while driving, while asking my dad for money, and while running without my inhaler.) As such, I'm going to attempt to write a reasonably readable review of the latest little gadget that's come into my life.

If you don't feel like slogging through all the complaining and raving I'm about to launch into, here's the brief version of this review:

My track record with cell phones could be better, but it could be much, much worse. To date, I've possessed a grand total of five cell phones, and only two of those (the first one and the current one) weren't replaced because I killed them (well, one wasn't completely dead when I got a new one... but it was almost there). Typical deaths of cell phones at my hands are products of (primarily) lots of dropping, exposure to unusual environments (e.g. the beach), and general wear and tear (e.g. lots and lots and lots of texting). I've come to terms with the fact that I am the worst person on the face of the planet to own electronic devices. For example, I know that I should probably never own an iPod Touch or iPhone simply because that little beauty would be reduced to functioning only as a paperweight in about a week. When my latest phone (the Blackberry Pearl 8110) crapped out on me, I wasn't terribly surprised. Due to my abusive nature, I set out on a mission to find a tank of a cell phone; I needed to find something indestructible, something that would last longer than a year, something that could withstand... well... me.

The Old Piece of Junk... I mean... Phone
The year was 2008. I had just graduated, and in three months I would be jetting to the other side of the country to start school at the Institvte. My little Pantech whatever-ma-bob (you remember that super small phone? "The World's Smallest Cell Phone"? yeah, that's what I had) had held up fine through my last couple of years of high school, but I didn't expect it to make it through the summer, let alone college. I did a small amount of (okay, hardly any) research on phones, and made my decision after playing with some phones in the AT&T store. Clearly I make some mistakes in my life. I picked up the Blackberry Pearl 8110, fell in love with its size and half-assed QWERTY keyboard, and promptly decided that was the phone I wanted. Little did I know I had picked a phone whose operating system was finicky and featured or lacked a lot of things that made no sense whatsoever (e.g. why couldn't I set multiple alarms? why would the time never update from the network even though I told it to?). Its size and shape, which I had loved at first, turned out to be the perfect size and shape for falling out of one's pockets. As a result, I dropped this phone a lot. The operating system also liked to randomly stop working; all of a sudden the screen would be blank white and there would be a little turning hourglass. This even happened during phone calls.

To be fair, there were things I like about the Pearl; the texting interface was pretty great, and the predictive text was honestly the best feature that phone had. I text a lot, and I'm also a bit of a grammar/spelling nerd; having a phone that allowed me to perfectly punctuate and spell everything out without making me go crazy was a joy. I also liked that I could personalize the dictionary of the phone. It had good alarm volume and call quality was acceptable.

Ultimately, the phone speaker gave out (this may or may not have been caused by a trip to Newport where the wind was a little more persistent than usual), and I could only have phone conversations on speakerphone. This was just the excuse I needed, because I was beginning to hate that operating system more than anything.

The Search Criteria and Selection
I had the bar set pretty high when I started my quest to find a new phone. I clearly wanted it to be better than my Pearl, and I desperately wanted a full QWERTY keyboard. I also wanted to be able to be able to set multiple alarms (weird, I know... but it's important), have wi-fi access, and to be able to operate without the OS crashing. In addition, there was no way in hell I was going to get a phone that runs on Mobile Windows (don't question - I have my reasons... and I don't honestly feel like boring you with them here).

After I figured out what I wanted, I spent some time browsing through the AT&T website, reading cell phone reviews.

DON'T EVER DO THAT.

Seriously. The people that review cell phones on the AT&T website made me want to... I don't know... They just made me feel like I could be violent. I guess I shouldn't get mad at people for being completely illiterate and unhelpful, but this was beyond the usual internet stupidity.

With no thanks to the AT&T customer community (not that I should have expected anything else), I went to the local AT&T store to play around with phones to get a feel for things, then I spent some time reading through blogs online. Eventually I determined that the Nokia E71x was probably my best bet.

The Verdict
I love this phone (for the most part). It's superior to the Pearl in a lot of ways, but there are still a few things that I wish were a bit different. I'll start with the things I'm happy with...

Pros
Basically, this phone fulfills all of the requirements I had when I started my search for a new phone. I can set multiple alarms. I have wi-fi capabilities. It has a Symbian OS. It doesn't crash. It has a full QWERTY keyboard. It's also a tank! The case is stainless steel, and there doesn't appear to be a whole lot of plastic parts that are going to break. It's sleek, it's sexy, and it's the perfect size and weight to fit in your palm and not feel like a piece of junk. The hot buttons are great. I can put PDFs on it and actually read them. Essentially, everything about this phone is fantastic.

Cons
There are a few things that I wish were different on this phone. First and foremost, the texting interface is terrible. I will say that maybe it just takes some getting used to, especially because I was so in love with the Blackberry interface. But so far, I hate it. The predictive text feature is really obnoxious, and doesn't seem too "trainable". I don't even bother using it. I would rather type everything out than deal with telling the phone what I want it to type. I also hate that the clock is tiny, and sometimes the H button doesn't work (though that's probably just operator error...).

Essentially, this phone is badass, despite its flaws. It's also a better phone than that Blackberry. If you're looking for a phone that can actually do things that are useful, all while looking great and holding up to serious abuse, all while not being an iPhone, the Nokia E71x is probably a good bet. Oh, and did I mention that it's only about $100? This phone's just an all-around winner.

A New Perspective on a Familiar Place

2009-08-06T20:34:00.000-04:00

[Clearly I haven't blogged in a while... Summer's been full of fun and adventure! I'll be back at MIT in a little less than a month, so the fun and adventure will be coming to an end and will turn to fun, adventure and p-sets. As such, I'll be blogging more. I promise.]

I'd been to San Francisco before. Twice: once to visit Stanford back in the days of college decisions, and once to spend Christmas in a (slightly) warmer climate. As a result, I'd seen the Golden Gate Bridge, Haight-Ashbury, the Exploratorium and Fisherman's wharf a couple of times. Basically, both typical family vacations.

My friend Natalie wants to be a filmmaker (that doesn't really do much justice to what she wants to do... but I tried) and is looking at transferring to the Academy of Art University in San Francisco, and when she suggested we head down there for a visit, I couldn't have been more excited. A trip to a great city with one of my best friends in the summer? Definitely a win.

Rather than bore you with my usual "And then we did this, and then this, and then..." I'll just tell you about some of the awesome places we went. Also, our trip was July 6-12, so clearly some of the information here could have changed since. I also may have forgotten details since...

The Hotel
Four out of five of the nights of the trip were spent at the Gaylord Suites hotel in the Union Square area of San Francisco (the first night was spent at the Econolodge in Ashland, OR on our way south). The hotel was in a perfect location for walking around downtown, and was within walking distance of the SoMa district. There were several parking garages within a couple of blocks, and a lot of restaurants. There was also a Walgreen's drug store nearby, which came in handy. The only complaint I had about location was that it was literally a block away from the Tenderloin district. The Tenderloin... not the best place ever. It seemed okay-ish during the day (though we definitely didn't pass through there unless we were in a car), but at night it was incredibly noisy. The room was really nice - all ikea furniture, clean, and even had a flat-screen TV. For the location and amenities, the price was more than reasonable (check Expedia for reservations!) and I'd definitely stay there again.
The Food
One of my favorite things to do is find good restaurants to eat at. To be perfectly honest, I want to go back to San Francisco just to eat at all the restaurants that looked amazing. Unfortunately, I forget a lot of the places that we ate at... The one place that sticks out the most in my mind, however, is the Crepe House. We ate at the Gough Street location, but I'm sure the other locations are just as good. I had the chicken pesto crepe, and it was amazing. The crepe was perfect, the potatoes that came with it were perfect, and they have Orangina. Perfect. The only other place I remember having exceptional food was the restaurant/cafe in the Museum of Modern Art - definitely a great place to eat after a trip through the museum.

I can also safely say that most of the Starbucks we went to were flawless in service and quality... Except they rarely spelled my name correctly. (Really?! Every time it was spelled wrong, it was some weird spelling of Kelsey. Seriously. Just go with the most common spelling - it's not that hard.) What would a trip be to San Francisco without copious amounts of coffee?

The Places
We went to some pretty amazing places while in the Bay area. Probably because I'm a huge nerd, the Exploratorium was one of my favorites. Granted, the Exploratorium is my favorite science museum after OMSI. Anyway. It was awesome. Also awesome: the Museum of Modern Art. They had a Robert Frank exhibit and a joint exhibit featuring works by Ansel Adams and Georgia O'Keeffe. Being the photography nerd that I am, I was running around (well, almost... we didn't have much time before the museum closed) in love with a million different photographs. Definitely worth it. Prior to this trip, San Francisco was the furthest south I had ever been in California. That changed after our trip to the Monterey Bay Aquarium. While I was practically hyperventilating over contact sheets at MoMA, Natalie was dying with sheer joy at the aquarium. But understandably. It was an awesome aquarium. The exhibits were fantastic, and they filmed part of the fourth Star Trek movie there (yeah, we were excited about that). The sea horse exhibit was amazing, and the best part of the sea otter exhibit was the video screens featuring John Cleese.

Okay, so I'm just going to post a few pictures. Lame, I know, but they're probably better than the tales of us walking all over downtown San Francisco looking for coffee, food, and the Academy of Art.

The Palace of Fine Arts outside of the Exploratorium

Part of the Exploratorium (a.k.a. nerd heaven)

Part of the Yerba Buena gardens, and a view of the SoMA district. MoMA is the building with the weird disk on top.

The Same Old Excuses

2009-07-25T20:36:00.003-04:00

No, I haven't dropped off the face of the planet, I promise. I just need to actually sit down and blog...

Coming soon:

My adventures in San Francisco with my friend Natalie
Music goodness
Tales of a treasure hunt in which technology was no help (a.k.a. a recent geocaching/hiking trip)
A cell phone review for the ages
The latest addition to my family (hint: it has a tail)
Why I'm the worst sister in the world (and an exploration of molasses consumption)
Just how behind I am in Infinite Jest

... and probably a lot more!

This summer, despite things for Berkeley falling through, has been one big adventure with my friends and family. As such, there's been little time to sit down and chronicle it for you all. Sorry about that! I will definitely be making a bit more time to blog, so stay tuned!

Gem of the Week

2009-07-06T03:47:00.003-04:00

So, it's summertime, and clearly I've been doing things with all this free time I have (namely, sleeping and hanging out with people). But to be perfectly honest, there's not been much going on lately that's been blog-worthy that hasn't already been blogged, so that's why I haven't followed my schedule for the past week or so. As such, I'm going to be lame today and just tell you all that you should really check out this site:

Awkward Family Photos

I promise you, you will be entertained for hours.

Awesome posts will be coming soon, including tales from my upcoming trip to San Francisco! But in the meantime, enjoy the awkwardness that is creepy family photos.

Great Failures in Engineering, Donuts, and Downtown

2009-06-30T03:26:00.008-04:00

The Oregon Museum of Science and Industry (OMSI) is one of those rare temples of nerdiness, a haven for those that think jokes involving integrals are hilarious and that rumors of Rick Astley's death* are more depressing than William Shatner getting fat**, but only slightly less depressing than Optimus Prime dying***. I was invited to tag along this past Sunday because my dear friend Nathan had to help drive a group of high schoolers to Portland for a day of awesome and he needed someone there to help keep him sane.

*Not a Rickroll, I swear.
**Captain Kirk is supposed to be attractive... Fat William Shatner is not attractive.
**Reading the Wikipedia article on Optimus Prime was one of the most confusing/strange/nerdy things I've read in a long while.

We first casually solved some of the brainteaser puzzles, then we wandered into the permanent exhibit area on the second floor. These exhibits are the time-tested classics that every student in the Willamette Valley/Portland Metro area remembers from those elementary school field trips: paleontology, the human body, and geology. In the back of one of the rooms is a large tank of water, with sand in the bottom and a pump that creates waves. Thanks to the wave motion, there are distinct ripples that have formed in the sand. The name of these sand ripples was discussed; I remarked that they had a technical name of some sort, while Nathan maintained that they were probably just called "ripples in the sand". Posted at the end of the tank was a placard explaining the scientific principles in action, with a clearly labeled diagram.

(Mom and Dad, I know you're just itching to make a comparison to the frost vs. frozen dew debate ca. 2000, but if you could refrain, that'd be awesome. Thanks.)

Nathan: 1, Kelsey: 0

Naturally, as an institution that relies on admissions fees to maintain operation, OMSI has to cater to non-nerds as well, which translates to exhibits like their latest: CSI: The Experience. We braved this exhibit next, and breezed right through it. The exhibit clearly had a good intent, and is probably fairly entertaining for middle school students and people who watch the CSI television franchise. As I do not fit into either of these categories, I found the exhibit interesting on a superficial level. My writing class this past spring had us design exhibits for a science museum, so at OMSI I noticed little things, like how well the exhibit flowed (not terribly well), or how expensive things were (the CSI exhibit must have cost a fortune). The concept was great; three different crime scenes to investigate, with computer stations to help you "solve" the crime by guiding you through the evidence analysis. It was entertaining, but I don't know that I learned anything real worthwhile, other than the fact that CSI people are always portrayed as badasses and (SPOILER ALERT) you shouldn't keep kitchen herbs in your pickup truck because they might link you to your ex-husband's murder.

While I appreciate the many nerdy exhibits at OMSI, my favorite room by far is the Turbine Hall. Filled with water bottle rockets, computers, robots, and engineering activities, Turbine Hall is a massive mecca of all things hands-on and awesome. Nathan and I are both engineering majors (he's a mechanical engineering major at Gonzaga), so it goes without saying that we gravitated toward the bridge-building activity pretty much immediately (well, we were waiting for the robotic Connect Four game to free up so we could play... but of all the things we could pick to do in the meantime...). The challenge was to build a bridge out of computer paper over miniature "rivers" that could support four wooden blocks. The results?
Nathan's bridge:
My bridge (a.k.a. an example of why I'm 1E, not 1C):
Nathan: 2, Kelsey: 0

Nathan went on to win an epic game of robotic Connect Four, a game I only played occasionally (sans robots) at daycare in my youth. It was swiftly negated by my victory in the race of rubber band-powered paddle boats.

Nathan: 3, Kelsey: 1

Moral of the Story: OMSI wins. The Boston Museum of Science fails in comparison.

We spent the afternoon walking all over downtown Portland, which included a stop at the storied establishment known as Voodoo Doughnut. Special thanks to some random flickr user whose photo I have shamelessly posted here to illustrate the fact that I ordered the triple chocolate penetration doughnut (chocolate doughnut, with chocolate glaze, topped with Cocoa Puffs cereal and a name that is perilous to search for on Google Images).

Basically, it was an epic trip to Portland. I got a lot of exercise in (so. much. walking.) and the nerd-fest that was OMSI reminded me that I don't have to be at MIT to appreciate the finer, nerdier things in life.

[Infinite Jest update: I'm on page 105, and I survived footnote 24!]

No One Ever Said I Lacked Ambition

2009-06-24T19:49:00.004-04:00

Summer plans recently fell through (I was supposed to take a physics class at UC Berkeley, but things just didn't work out), so I found myself with about eleven weeks of nothingness.

Well, they're no longer weeks of nothingness. I plan on filling them with working for my dad's aircraft parts business, seeing friends, and reading. Lots and lots of reading. Rather than listing all the books I aim to plow through in the coming months, I'll just show them to you.

The two upright books on the right are the only two I've made it through so far. Clearly, I have a lot of work ahead of me.

Many of the books I'm part way through (one's a book I started for my high school senior English class and I never finished it), and there are only two that I haven't started yet (Naked Lunch and The Sound and the Fury). The book I'll be concentrating on most, however, is that behemoth on the bottom: Infinite Jest.

I've been interested in reading Infinite Jest for quite a while now, but for one reason or another I just haven't picked it up. And then I heard about Infinite Summer. Essentially, everyone participating in Infinite Summer is reading David Foster Wallace's massive tome from June 21st to September 22nd. It's really informal, you can read as fast as you want, and essentially there are no rules. Online there are forums and blogs from readers. Naturally, I can't pass this up, and it's motivation to actually sit down and read Infinite Jest. If this is something that's been on your to do list as well, I highly recommend participating - it's not too late!

Why I Shouldn't Watch Music Videos Late at Night

2009-06-18T05:00:00.002-04:00

Here's some unnecessary commentary on music videos I've seen late at night on VH1, VH1 Classic, Fuse, and MTV/2. Basically, I change the channel a lot, which is why there aren't any rap songs reviewed. And I also watch a lot of videos, which is why I just narrowed it down to the seven that were most interesting. I also was fairly concerned about avoiding the ridiculous number of Proactiv commercials, especially the ones featuring Jessica Simpson. I would just like to point out that some of this is not the music I usually listen to. I promise. If there were a TV channel that showed nothing but Decemberists, Spoon, Pixies, Mando Diao, and Franz Ferdinand videos all the time, I would so be there.

Billy Boy on Poison - "On My Way": This video actually makes no sense. Why would you play to an empty stadium? As a publicity stunt? Because the only people who are going to hear about it are the cops. As evidenced by them chasing you, instead of adoring fans. Despite the fact that this video was a little absurd, I like the song, but sometimes I'm a total sucker for rock 'n roll. [MTV2]

Franz Ferdinand - "No You Girls" (Embedding has been disabled): What? I don't get it. Did I miss something? You guys are virtually on my list of bands that can do no wrong (your debut album was flawless and is one of my all-time favorites), and this video isn't that bad (it's helped by lots of shots of Alex Kapranos), but you could have [done] it so much better... Sorry for the play on your album/song title. [MTV2]

All American Rejects - "The Wind Blows": The whole playing-the-music-in-the-ocean thing has been done... see Augustana's video for that one song where he whines about going to Boston a lot... [VH1]

The Pixies - "Here Comes Your Man (Live)"*: Thanks for making me want to see the Pixies live, now. Just not in such a large venue. If there are video screens showing just Frank Black's hand strumming the guitar, there's a problem. Also, Kim Deal looked like she really didn't want to be there. [VH1 Classic]
*Unfortunately, I can't find the one I originally saw... Sorry...

Mando Diao - "Dance With Somebody" (Embedding has been disabled): Can you fall in love with my favorite song? It's good to see that these Swedes are back with new music. [MTV2]

Taking Back Sunday - "Sink Into Me": I don't really know what you were getting at - it just looks like you all wanted to just make a mess with black paint. And the shots of you with the crowd came off as a little arrogant; was it necessary to remind us that you apparently have fans? [MTV2]

The Airborne Toxic Event - "Sometime Around Midnight": Wait, MTV is playing a rock song? It's not rap? The world is ending, ladies and gentleman. Anyway, the video's not bad, just a wee bit angsty. [MTV]

Sidenote to the record labels that disabled embedding on YouTube: what were you thinking? Not a smart move... Just sayin'...

This Plan Will Probably Fail Miserably

2009-06-15T05:00:00.000-04:00

I feel like I should at least give it a shot... I probably won't be able to follow through, but then again, that's how I initially felt about this blog, and it's still going strong over a year after its inception. Well, not really strong. I've kind of been slacking off lately. I suppose I could use the whole "I'm a busy MIT student" excuse, but all that is is an excuse. A really lame excuse.

So here's my plan: I'm going to have a posting schedule. I figure that forcing myself to post at least twice a week is probably a good way to make sure my posts are a little bit more focused, as well as more succinct. Because if you wanted to read a novel, you would do just that, rather than read my blog. I may post more than the two days a week, but when I eventually run out of things to talk about (my mother is laughing right now - I'm willing to place money on that) I'll probably just start complaining about pop music and bad music videos, or weird news stories. Clearly this would be less than optimal content, but content is content, no?

What days can you wake up super-early to check your Google Reader?

Mondays and Thursdays, my friends. Mondays and Thursdays at 5:00 AM Eastern.

What? I said super-early. And it's not like I'm going to be up at that hour; thanks to the magic of the internets, I can schedule those suckers to post themselves.

To make up for how thoroughly boring this post was, here's a random selection from Fail Blog that really isn't that funny:

I Think a Part of Me Just Died

2009-06-12T03:49:00.004-04:00

My younger brother and I were watching some music videos on VH1 Classic (because I am a cruel, mean, and terrible older sister and had control of the remote) when the video for "Miss You" by the Rolling Stones (from the album Some Girls) came on. At this point my brother asked who the artist was.

Naturally, I was stunned. Mick Jagger was taking up the entire screen at that moment, so I asked him to guess.

His guesses?

Bob Dylan

Jim Morrison
Elton John

I think it's pretty safe to say that none of these men really look like Mick Jagger.

Now, his music illiteracy might be excusable, perhaps even a touch endearing, if he were six or something. But he's not. He's fifteen. 15! We have Some Girls on vinyl in our basement! We have other albums by the Rolling Stones on vinyl in our basement! We have multiple record turntables in this household! Basically, this is highly unacceptable, and I'm kind of ashamed.

True Loaf Love

2009-06-11T22:45:00.003-04:00

How to create brand loyalty if you're a cheese company:

1. Make amazing cheese.
2. Make amazing ice cream... and amazing dairy products in general.
3. Allow people to go on factory tours.
4. Have a guy dress up as a baby loaf of cheese and make appearances.

5. Join Twitter, and have an awesome website.
6. Have amazing ad campaigns.

Basically, if you live in Oregon, there's really only one brand of cheese that you buy: Tillamook. Maybe Bandon, but that's owned by Tillamook, so basically, just Tillamook. Also, if you grew up in the Willamette Valley or on the coast, chances are you went to the Tillamook Cheese Factory on a field trip in elementary school once (or twice... or basically any year your school had money to send classes on field trips (I guess I went to a poor school, so we really only got legitimate field trips every couple of years)). I even had a friend smuggle some Tillamook Cheese into Scotland (okay, so she claims it was by accident - for some reason she had some cheese in her suitcase? Anyway, Customs didn't find it, so no big, right?). I also once got an entire mini-bus full of high school students lost on the way back from an FFA forestry contest/cheese factory trip (our bus then broke down in the woods... That day is known as "Kelsey's Grand Adventure" now). So, naturally, when you get home from your first year at college you make the pilgrimage with two of your best friends pretty much immediately to that fantastical world of happiness... and cheese.

After a delicious lunch in a small diner (called the Cow Belle Cafe – hilarious, I know) in Rockaway Beach, we headed down to Tillamook, the land of cheese. (Well, they also have an amazing air museum and a forestry center, but those will be visited on a later trip to the coast...) Upon entering the doors into their magical dairy kingdom, we were presented with a great number (okay, so only two) of possibilities: do we eat ice cream now, or after the tour? Clearly, the answer to that question is after the tour; we could build up our appetites, and we'd be able to truly appreciate the work the Tillamook County Creamery Association put into the product. Just before heading upstairs to the viewing areas, we stopped for the requisite photo (when there are boards with paintings or pictures on them, and cutouts for faces, a photo is required, no if's, and's or but's).

They're probably going to hate me for that...

Then we headed upstairs to the viewing areas. They tell me pictures are worth a thousand words, so rather than attempting to explain all of the awesomeness, I'll just post photos.

Because I'm a food science nerd, I was naturally excited to locate all the HACCP checkpoints...
So. Many. Ice. Cream. Flavors. (38, to be precise!)

Award-winning deliciousness.

After we were done learning about the wonders of cheese-making, it was time for SAMPLES! Medium, sharp, extra sharp – there was cheddar aplenty. I may or may not have taken more than my fair share of cubes of the extra sharp... It's pretty tasty stuff. Then it was gift shop time!

Mmmmm... Cheese curds!

A whole freezer of Tillamook ice cream! Yum!

We explored the gift shop for a while, then we had ice cream, because that's pretty much a requirement when you go to the Tillamook Cheese Factory (okay, it's not a requirement, but if you don't get ice cream, then you're doing something wrong). Normally, I get vanilla, or some permutation of vanilla (e.g. French Vanilla, Vanilla Bean), but when you're faced with 38 delectable flavors, it's time to branch out. I told my friends that they weren't allowed to let me get anything involving vanilla. Fortunately, my order of Orange Sherbet* was acceptable. It contrasted nicely with the bright blue tables (and are the Tillamook colors, no less!). Also exciting: they use the "plastic" silverware made from corn!

* I've always been so confused about the pronunciation of this word. I can't seem to get it right; I just know the wrong way. My computer's dictionary sounds like someone gets a little annoyed by people pronouncing it incorrectly, though:
"USAGE The tendency to insert an r into the second syllable of sherbet is very common. Frequency of misuse has not changed the fact that the spelling sherbert and the pronunciation |ˈ sh ərbərt|are wrong and should not be considered acceptable variants."

All in all, it was an awesome trip to the coast; the Tillamook Cheese Factory never fails to disappoint, and now I have a mini squishy foam Baby Loaf that I can throw at my younger brother when he tries to make me listen to bad rap music or talks during Jeopardy!.

IFF-y Movies

2009-06-04T00:00:00.001-04:00

There used to be a small independent theater in McMinnville, a short half-hour drive from my house. This is where I went to see movies like Miyazaki's "Howl's Moving Castle" on the big screen because the multi-cine-whatever-plex down the street didn't show movies like that. Then, right before "Science of Sleep" was released, they closed. I can remember being rather unhappy about this because I had really wanted to see that movie, but would have had to somehow get up to Portland to do so. (Funny story - I still haven't seen that movie. I guess I should probably do that at some point.) Eventually, I learned that going up to Portland was the only option for seeing independent or limited release films that no one in my hometown cared about. I forget just how many movies I saw up there or which ones, but I know that "Smart People" was among them.

When I moved to Boston, I realized that my movie-watching horizons were suddenly ridiculously open. AMC Lowes and Regal own a lot of theaters in the Boston area, and there are at least three that are accessible by the T from MIT (Harvard Square, Boston Common and Fenway). There are also a number of smaller, independent theaters (though the large corporate ones do a good job of showing a wide variety of movies most of the time) in the Cambridge area (Kendall Square, Somerville Theater in Davis Square, and the Brattle Theater in Harvard Square).

By April, all the movies I had seen (that weren't put on by LSC) had been at the AMC theater at Boston Common. Thanks to the wonderful properties of Twitter, however, I soon discovered that Boston has a film festival, meaning more opportunities to see good movies! The Independent Film Festival (IFF) of Boston was primarily located at the Somerville Theater, with a few films at the Institute for Contemporary Art. After figuring out my schedule, I promptly bought tickets online for three films: "500 Days of Summer", "Upstream Battle" and "Art & Copy". I wish that I could have fit "The Brothers Bloom" in, but I had p-sets due, so I guess I'll see it sometime this summer.

(500) Days of Summer
One of my favorite movies of all time is "Brick", a modern-day film noir set in a California high school, starring Joseph Gordon-Levitt. When I heard that he was in "(500) Days of Summer" I instantly knew that I'd be seeing it at some point. It was featured at IFF, but it's official release date is July 17th (yep, the same weekend as Harry Potter 6). To be perfectly honest, I can't recommend this movie enough.

Zooey Deschanel costars, and the acting is superb. It's definitely a quirky movie, which I suppose means that some people won't like it. It chronicles a break-up, and bounces around between different days of the 500 days Tom (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) is in love with Summer (Zooey Deschanel). While I felt that the concept of the film not progressing chronologically was annoying, it actually proved to be fantastic in practice. By switching the date between the early days of their relationship and the later dates, the overall emotion of the film would change instantly, but rather than be obnoxious it created comedy. Despite the fact that this was a break-up movie, I was laughing the entire time. I thought it was hilarious.

Basically, you should go see this movie. Oh, and don't be late; right before the movie began, there was a short disclaimer similar to an "author's note" that was worth seeing because it's hilarious.

Upstream Battle
Focusing on the Native American tribes living in the Klamath Basin of southern Oregon/northern California, Ben Kempas's documentary follows their battle with the local power corporation. They're not complaining about prices, they're complaining about fish. The PacifiCorp power company operates four dams on the river, generating electricity for Oregon and California. Unfortunately, the dams are responsible for massive die-offs in the local salmon population. The tribes along the river rely on the salmon, that return to the river to spawn, for food. The ecology of the dams and the salmon population can get fairly complex, but the documentary did an amazing job of presenting it in an understandable way. The film is an eye-opening glimpse into the cultures of the tribes, as well as how large corporations respond to whistle-blowing. Also, we learn that Warren Buffett apparently doesn't care about salmon.

I'm not sure about release dates; the film seems to be hitting the festival circuit. Check out the website for screening information.

Art & Copy
In high school I was involved in several FFA contests that involved advertisement design and marketing, so I thought that a documentary focusing on some of the most well-known ad campaigns would be incredibly interesting. I was right in my assumption that it would be interesting, but I can't say that it was my favorite of the three films I saw at IFF. They covered the history of notable ads (e.g. Apple's 1984 ad, Nike's "Just Do It" campaign), and they also followed a man who posts billboards for a living, and the launching of communications sattelites. To be perfectly honest, I think they should have left out the latter two story lines. The film seemed to jump around a lot, and histories were fragmented in such a way that it was a little difficult to follow at a couple of points. No details were given about the sattelites, and all that was shown was a series of shots of a shuttle slowly creeping toward the launch pad. In the end, I think it's worth seeing, mostly because the history of such recognizable advertisements and icons in our society is fascinating.

Boston: The Music

2009-05-24T22:45:00.002-04:00

[I originally had a really really long post planned, covering the past couple of months, because I've been a terrible blogger and owe you all a legitimate post. Problem is, it got to be about the length of a novel, and I figure that breaking it up a little will make it more readable. This first installment, I'll just cover my experiences with the Boston music scene.]

In the Boston area, more venues are 18+, as opposed to 21+ like most of the good venues in Portland are (e.g. the Doug Fir, Berbati's Pan). It seems as though all ages shows are a bit rare in Boston, but as a college student over the age of 18, it's is heaven for shows!

The Orpheum (Boston)
The Orpheum is a stately venue in Boston, right off the Park Street T stop. Oddly enough, it has seating. I saw Andrew Bird there in January, and it was my first show with seating like that. While I think I still prefer shows where you stand, the seating situation wasn't terrible.

Portland/Oregon Equivalent: the Crystal Ballroom
Shows Seen Here: Loney, Dear/Andrew Bird

The Paradise Rock Club (Boston)
Located directly across from the Pleasant Street T stop on the Green Line, the Paradise is in the heart of BU-land. It's a pretty nice venue, and they have these platform/balcony areas at different heights along the sides and back of the room so you can sit or stand up there if you want, or you can be up against the stage, like I was for the Of Montreal show I went to back in April.

fire Zuave and Sugar and Gold opened, and then Of Montreal played in all their glory. For some reason, they didn't play a cover, which actually was really sad. Though, Kevin Barnes did prance around on stage a lot, and he kept his clothes on. I ended up going home covered in glitter and feathers (they dropped feathers on the audience from the ceiling twice over the course of the show), which is a fantastic way to leave a show, in my opinion.

Portland/Oregon Equivalent: the Roseland Theater, but far less sketchy
Shows Seen Here: fire Zuave/Sugar and Gold/Of Montreal

(The first two photos are of Sugar and Gold, and all the ones after them are of Of Montreal.)

TT the Bear's Place (Cambridge)
I saw the Wombats here back in September, and the venue was mind-blowing! It's phenomenally intimate, and really close to campus, which is really nice. Big names don't really play here, but if you listen to more obscure stuff, it's great because it's so small.

Portland/Oregon Equivalent: ?
Shows Seen Here: Paper Tigers/the Postelles/the Wombats

The Middle East (Cambridge)
The Middle East is essentially this complex on a corner in Cambridge, up in Central Square. They have a bar and restaurant, as well as two concert venues, Upstairs and Downstairs. I've only seen shows in the Downstairs, and I feel like more recognizable groups play there. Downstairs is fairly small and intimate, with a low ceiling, and it's really dark thanks to the black paint (a la the Roseland theater in Portland). They also start the shows an hour and a half after the doors open, which is pretty annoying. Shows there run pretty late, but it's really close to campus (it's right next to TT the Bear's), so walking back isn't really a big deal.

The Thermals show was amazing! I ended up crushed up against the monitors at the front of the stage with my friend Zoe, and the former general manager of WMBR, Ben, was there as well. The show was energetic and fun, and totally worth the bruises.

Dan Deacon was AWESOME! And I mean that in the induced-awe sense. That man has some amazing power over people. At several points during the show, he climbed down off the stage into the audience, and then instructed us to do things. He first had everyone in the room running laps (Zoe and I sat on the bar on the side of room to avoid certain injury), then he had people dancing like it was the 1800s, and the final crazy thing he got the crowd to do was incredible. He had everyone go to one side of the room, then he had some people form a tunnel with their arms, and then told everyone to go through the tunnel, and once they got to the other side to form another arch with their arms to add onto the tunnel. This tunnel clearly had to go somewhere, so he had the tunnel go up the stairs, outside through the side door, around the corner to the front door of the restaurant, in through the restaurant, and back down the stairs again. And people actually complied. Basically, the show was a huge dance-fest, and is probably one of the best shows I've ever been to. Unfortunately, the pictures I took were deleted by my computer (this is why I'll never own a digital SLR... but that's another rant), so I can't post any of the awesomeness for you.

Portland/Oregon Equivalent: ?
Shows Seen Here: Murder By Death, Point Juncture, WA/the Shaky Hands/the Thermals, Future Islands/Dan Deacon

MIT
Yep, MIT. Every year, MIT puts on a shindig in April, with a big concert in the athletic center, and a million other little events. This year, WMBR also put on a free spring music festival on the steps of Kresge auditorium. I had an event with Pi Phi during most of it, so I missed out on quite a few of the bands, but I was able to help the Harlem Shakes clean up after their set, and I saw +/-! I then went to the Ben Folds show. Hotel Lights was the first opener, and they weren't too fantastic. I guess their drummer was sick, so they did an acoustic set, but it was painfully boring. They were followed by Sara Barielles (or however you spell her name). While I don't normally listen to her music, she was great live, mostly because she's a good performer and said hilarious things in between songs. Part way through Ben Folds' set, I realized I had stopped keeping up with his music in 2005, after I saw him live with Ben Lee and Rufus Wainwright. I didn't know many of his new songs, and he played very few songs from the Ben Folds Five era. He also wasn't as all over the place as he was when I saw him the first time. A lot of people I talked to thought the sing-along portion was pretty great, but I just kind of shrugged in response, because the other time I saw him he did that too, but while standing/jumping around on top of his piano. While I was kind of disappointed by the show overall, there were two parts I am so happy I had the opportunity to hear. A while back, Ben Folds officially retired his rendition of Dr. Dre's "Bitches Ain't Shit" from his live repetoire. I had heard him play it live already, so I wasn't devastated by this news, and I didn't expect it when he played at MIT. The audience, however, was pretty insistent, and he ended up playing it. Which was awesome. The other amazing thing was the song he made up on the spot about MIT. He sang that he "loves me the gym" because of the echo, and poked fun at MIT, singing that we just "think about intellectual techinical shit," and that the crowd was siginificantly less drunk than the crowd at the show he had played the night before (which is probably true). Overall, the show was okay, and was not helped by the room getting disgustingly warm.

Portland/Oregon Equivalent: Oregon State Fair Pavilion
Shows Seen Here: Harlem Shakes/+/- (plus/minus), Hotel Lights/Sara Barielles/Ben Folds

+/- on the steps of Kresge

Overall, the music scene in Boston is probably the thing I like most about the city. Maybe it's because the shows are more accessible because I live in the city (rather than driving two hours there and back in Oregon), but whatever it is, I like it.

One Down, Three to Go

2009-05-21T00:46:00.002-04:00

I am officially done with my freshman year at MIT.

(Well, okay, so I technically am still a freshman at MIT until the class of 2013 arrives on campus in the fall, but I don't really like this whole "conservation of freshman" mumbo jumbo, so whatevs.)

I only had two finals this week: 18.01 (single variable calculus) and 7.014 (biology with ecology). After studying a fair amount (I'll post pictures of where I studied, soon, by the way; any bibliophiles will love the Boston Public Library), I took the 7.014 final on Tuesday morning, and then finished my 18.01 final Wednesday morning. And now I'm completely, 100% done with freshman year. Any control over my grades is no longer in my hands; all tests are taken, all p-sets are turned in, and all papers have been submitted.

It feels kind of... strange. I actually feel like a real MIT student to some degree. I don't think I'll actually feel completely like an MIT student until I have the huge hunk of metal known as a Brass Rat gracing my right-hand ring finger (which will happen in less than a year!), but I at least know that I can survive the classes here. Hell, not just survive, but thrive; I got an A in my writing class (21W.732) (this prompted a jumping-up-and-down-and-laughing session this afternoon when I checked WebSIS - totally warranted!). Granted, I still hate, and am terrible at, physics, and I'm still not the greatest at math. 7.014 only strengthened my love of biology (though my TA did make me a little frustrated at times), and my writing class made me ridiculously happy. Getting an A in that class, and considering how much I enjoyed it, has pushed me to consider a career (at least for a while) in writing a little bit more, and now I don't think it's such a far-fetched idea. I think taking classes on topics I enjoy definitely correlates with better grades (though I still am waiting on my 7.014 grade...), and that realization makes me excited for next year, when I'll be taking classes that actually matter for my major. Regardless, I can survive at MIT.

Of all the things I've done in my life, surviving at MIT feels like one of the top accomplishments. And that's just surviving. If I can somehow manage to do remotely well here, I will be the most content person in the world.

Strange Comparison of the Week

2009-05-18T11:58:00.004-04:00

I love the New York Times.

Good luck on finals, everyone!

Dead Week Deadness

2009-05-14T19:34:00.004-04:00

I'm alive, I promise.

Quick updates:

Finals week is next week. As such, I'm fairly stressed over studying and papers, etc. I don't really have time to think.

Allergy season is in full swing here in Boston. Consequently, I've basically been feeling like crap for the past couple of weeks, and over the counter medication was not cutting it at all. Flonase for the win!

I saw Dan Deacon live with my friend Zoe last night. Let's just say that man is a god/genius/wonderful human being, and I wish I had that kind of power over people. I guess I just need to invest in a vocoder? A detailed post is coming, I promise. I also saw the Thermals last week, and despite being squished up against the monitors, it was totally worth it - such an amazing show!

Just wanted to let you all know I haven't dropped on the face of the earth, and that I'll be posting real, legit posts in about a week, after my 18.01 and 7.014 finals are over and I'm packed and ready to head home. I have a lot of fun stuff to write about, and when I have time and I'm not thinking about integrals and Taylor series and recombinant DNA all the time, I'll post again!

MIT students: Good luck with your finals! And freshman, enjoy your last week of the year! One down, three to go...

Just a sneak peek of things to come!

Hometown... Represent (?)

2009-05-01T15:25:00.002-04:00

Willamina's in the news again. This is getting a tad bit absurd. Honestly, for such a small town, I fail to understand how it manages to end up in the news so often. Nothing really goes on there. Willamina's been in the news for bomb threats, crazy people, controversy over a cat at the library, an "illegal immigrant-free zone", overly-productive teenage girls, and now the H1N1 virus (yep, I'm not going to call it "swine flu" because the CDC is correct in their reasoning for why they won't call it that either). So, I suppose that stuff does go on there, but it's no more than any other small town. I really just don't get it. Maybe all the major news channels want an excuse to send their reporters out there so they can go to the casino (a.k.a. the second largest tourist attraction in the state)? I have no idea.

Can someone in Willamina please just win the Nobel Prize or something, so we don't look so ridiculous in the news? That'd be great, thanks.

Maintaining Sanity While Finishing P-Sets

2009-04-30T02:54:00.003-04:00

The key: MUSIC.

I had around 5300 songs in my music library. After spending some time on You Ain't No Picasso and the Hood Internet, I have around 150 new tracks, meaning that I have new music that I'm not bored with (yes, I'm a freak and get bored with the 5000+ songs I have on my computer...).

Among them: Webbie vs. Black Moth Super Rainbow from the Hood Internet. Basically, I'm a fan. I also really liked the mix of Beyonce's "Single Ladies" and Fleet Foxes's "Ragged Wood".

Anything else on the Hood Internet site is great, as well. I don't really know any of the rap songs they mix with, but I know (and own) virtually every single other song they mix with.

Another fun site: We Are Hunted. It's an online music chart that tracks mentions of songs in blogs, on Twitter, and the like. The weekly chart is kind of bad (Britney Spears? Really?), but the emerging/daily chart is usually pretty good! It's essentially an easy way to hear new music without having to visit a million different sites...

Okay, enough with the music talk. I promise that a real post is on the way - this week is a little busy/stressful. Plus, my allergies are acting up (I don't have swine flu, I promise!) and I really don't feel like doing much of anything... Soon, promise!

Beautiful Weather = Photos!

2009-04-28T00:54:00.010-04:00

It's officially springtime in Boston! As such, I've taken a million pictures with the snazzy new digital camera I got for my birthday a while back... I promise a real blog with actual text about the amazing stuff that's been going on around MIT and Boston is on the way. But for right now, I'm going to rely on the old adage that a picture is worth a thousand words, and leave you all with some photos! Enjoy...

[Mmmmm, dining... My camera has a "food mode" that's supposed to help make the food look "more appetizing". I think food from dining is going to need a bit of help in that department.]

Donuts, Fish, and Maple Syrup

2009-04-24T13:20:00.003-04:00

It sounds vaguely like something you'd find at Dunkin' Donuts.

(Okay, I'll stop making fun of Dunkin' Donuts now. I still don't understand why people like them, though. I really just miss Dutch Brothers...)

Something actually ate donuts, fish, and maple syrup, though. But it was a bear. I don't know why, but I found this story to be kind of comical. Maybe it's because of that disgusting food combination...

Wily black bear succumbs to donuts, fish in trap

Coming soon: a blog (with pictures!) about the Of Montreal show I went to (AMAZING!!!), Spring Weekend, and the Independent Film Festival Boston 2009. Sorry I've been a little lax about blogging lately - the term has been a little busy. It's going better than last term, though, and it's almost summer!!!

One last thing: The police definitely called in the bomb squad for this this morning. Clearly, it's not ACTUALLY a bomb, but I think it was probably a good call just to investigate. Better safe than sorry? Sort of like the bomb threats we had in high school (ahhh, public schools...) - it's a pain in the ass to have to deal with bomb squads and whatnot, but it's better than potentially dealing with a bunch of injured bystanders...

Well, I declare!*

2009-04-18T10:33:00.003-04:00

*Note: best when said with a Southern accent.

It was three sheets of carbon copy glory: white, yellow, and pink pieces of paper, all clearly stating the same fantastic fact.

I am now an environmental engineering major!

MIT doesn't allow freshman to declare their major until the end of their first year (we're too busy taking the GIRs oftentimes, to worry about classes within our major just yet), and then all of a sudden in the middle of April you meet with your advisor and you're given a form where you just check a little box and that's all it takes to declare. Despite the fact that the form is clearly boring and the whole process is rather anticlimactic, it's still kind of exciting to think that now I'm officially going into environmental engineering, that I'm almost a sophomore, and that freshman year is nearly over!

B-T-Dubs: the new Yeah Yeah Yeahs is not half bad. I wish they had played some of this at some of the CPW parties I went to last night (all the frats throw dry parties for the prefrosh!), because it's boring when they play rap music the whole time - it all starts to sound the same. Bad DJs make me sad.

Hilarity

2009-04-14T00:31:00.003-04:00

I forget how I originally found this site, but it happened. Which is a good thing, because it is hilarious.

Breakfast At Sulimay's

Essentially, it's three... senior citizens... reviewing current indie rock and rap tracks. Ann is my favorite, not just because she dances along with the rap songs and throws gang signs, but also because at one point she says the song "I Will Possess Your Heart" by Death Cab for Cutie "f*cks with" her. All three reviewers are rather quirky, and their responses to the music are amusing. I also liked when Joe tells !!! (chk chk chk) to take more music lessons. If you like music, have a good sense of humor, and don't live under a rock (some of the music may be considered obscure by some - which means they should get out more), then you will probably appreciate this.

If you can, I also highly recommend checking out the Shepard Fairey exhibit that's at the ICA right now - it was fantastic!

Impressive!

2009-04-07T06:42:00.003-04:00

Yes, that time stamp is correct.

It's official, ladies and gentlemen! I have officially just pulled my first all-nighter here at MIT. There's really no point in me going to sleep before my 10 AM class. I've also set a personal record for number of hours spent in the Student Center Reading Room. My previous record was around seven hours, but I just upped it to ten.

While I am going to crash at some point today, I can crash easily, knowing that I am finally done with a massive paper! I can also crash easily knowing that I sent a million and two e-mails to people in a million different departments about transfer credit, declaring my major, and the like.

The most impressive part, though? I've managed to do all this and the only caffeine I've had in the last 36 hours has been a bottle of Coke. This is weird, because I am rather addicted to caffeine, have it all the time, and normally I need a lot more to even remotely feel the effects of it.

This can't be healthy.

Biting the Twitter Bullet

2009-03-29T21:17:00.002-04:00

I did it.

I finally joined Twitter.

It's weird... I feel like a lot of people are joining Twitter, and supposedly this is THE new thing. I also feel like this is going to be something I will quickly get addicted to (especially because I can use my cell phone to update, from anywhere!) just like facebook and blogging and the myriad of other internet things I check compulsively every five minutes. But, oddly enough, I don't think I actually know anyone that uses Twitter. Okay, I'm sure I do - I am a student at MIT after all, so if it's on the internet, I know at least one person here that knows about it - but I don't actually know who or usernames or anything. So Twitter looks a little lonely right now...

twitter.com/kelseyrkennedy

Please don't let me be that loner kid that no one talks to. I'm nice, I swear.

Saving a Landmark

2009-03-28T13:34:00.004-04:00

So, this was obviously taken around Christmas-time, hence the red nose, but you get the idea...

For the first time in my life, I think I am okay with an instance where the government would use eminent domain. Most of the time, I'm not the biggest fan of governments using eminent domain because oftentimes they don't exactly put the land to good use, or are just generally incompetent.

But for once, I think it's a brilliant idea. The property to be claimed? The Made In Oregon sign in Portland. This sign has a long history, and is a landmark on the city skyline. The problem? The University of Oregon wants it to say their name instead. The solution? The city of Portland is considering using eminent domain to claim ownership of the sign.

The sign has had its share of facelifts over the years. The sign originally read "White Satin" in honor of the building's sugar-producing tenants. It was later changed to read "White Stag" after the new occupants, a clothing company. Twelve years ago, the sign was updated to the current "Made In Oregon". The sign has become an integral part of Portland (and Oregon) culture, and the threat of change has angered a lot of people around the city.

I will say right now, that if they change it, I'm going to be pissed. U of O, I'm not just saying this because I'm a Beavers fan. Seriously, just respect the tradition.

Related Articles:

City might just declare eminent domain on the 'Made in Oregon' sign

Oh, deer. 'Made in Oregon' on its way out in Old Town

WOLVERINES!

2009-03-26T16:48:00.005-04:00

Fear not, my dear and faithful readers! I am, in fact, alive. MIT and the usual things that just come up in life have kept me from blogging. Exams, papers, p-sets, resumes and applications for government jobs that probably don't actually exist because of budget cuts (thanks a lot, NRCS), helping run MIT's debate tournament, and Spring Break have basically made life incredibly busy. Well, saying that Spring Break is making my life busy is kind of a lie - I'm spending Spring Break here in Boston, with very little to actually do. I guess I've been exploring the city, using my camera, and reading, instead of blogging. On the upside, I finally saw Watchmen.

(Funny story - I went and saw it by myself in the afternoon a couple of days ago at the AMC Loews (a.k.a. professional wallet rapists - $8.75 for a matinee? REALLY? and $8.50 for a small popcorn and a small soda? REALLY?) in Boston Commons, and looking around the theater, I noticed something. Everyone there was there by themselves. Yep, I saw Watchmen with all of the other single, loser comic book (... I mean, "graphic novel") fans, most of whom were probably seeing it for the fifty bajillionth time. Needless to say, I walked out of that theater with a little less dignity than I walked in there with. Oh, and my verdict on the movie: it was awesome! I don't care that the ending was different, I was completely happy with the movie all the way through.)

I was also pretty excited to get my hands on a copy of the new Decemberists album, The Hazards of Love. Reason #1340974519384 why I love being a member of WMBR: I was listening to The Hazards of Love last Saturday. It came out this past Tuesday. I didn't have to pay for a thing. Promotional copies are fantastic. This new album is the first of their full-lengths to not get a score of at least 8 from Pitchfork, and for once I agree (Pitchfork and I are usually not the best of pals - Pitchfork doesn't know this of course, but I tend to disagree with most of their scores, and their reviewers... but what do I know, right?). While this album clearly has the usual hallmarks of a Decemberists album, it lacks a few elements that make a Decemberists album truly great. This album is much darker than their previous works (yes, it is possible - gone are the days of songs of vindictive sea-faring orphans - they've moved on to talk of killing babies), and the songs are clearly intended to be listened to in order. The single, "The Rake's Song" can only be truly appreciated in context with the other songs on the album, which present the listener with a very detailed and intricate plot line that can occasionally be difficult to follow without the liner notes (which they've generously provided on their website). I once told a friend of mine that of all the musical groups I listen to and love, the only two that I feel can do no wrong are Spoon and the Decemberists. I still feel this way, and will continue to unconditionally love the Decemberists despite The Hazards of Love. I mean, I like it, but I think I'm going to go back to listening to The Crane Wife and Castaways and Cutouts.

There's no rest for MIT students, though. Well, I suppose I could have not done any work over break, but I would have payed dearly for it next week. So interspersed between all the exploring of Boston and photography and literature binges, I've been working on my 14-page museum exhibit design proposal for my writing class. Surprisingly, it hasn't been that bad. Maybe it's because I love writing, or maybe it's because there's not really any pressure right now. No clue. Regardless, I'm certainly not complaining. We also had a requirement to critique a speech or presentation for my writing class, which I'm knocking out tonight by going to a forum on food locavorism, which should be interesting. I'm interested to see how they portray agriculture and family farms.

And finally, the reason behind the blog title: wolverines are BACK! Those things are vicious, and I hope I never come across one while camping or hiking. I think I'd probably hyperventilate. Or have an asthma attack while running away. Actually, the asthma attack is probably more likely.

[Congrats to the MIT Class of 2013! Can't wait to meet you all at CPW and in the fall!]

Why do I do this to myself?

2009-03-03T03:07:00.002-05:00

Holy mother of god, I just want this to be over with.

I have been sitting here in the reading room in the Student Center for approximately eight (8!) hours now, and I think I'm going to go insane. The two 20 ounce bottles of Coca-Cola, one bottle of XXX Vitamin Water, bag of Kettle Chips, bag of Mini Oreos, Kit-Kat bar, and iTunes mix of Spoon, Bobby Darin, YACHT, and the Builders and the Butchers are the only things keeping me from becoming a blathering blob of goo on the floor.

For some ridiculous reason, I thought it would be intelligent to leave my two papers for 21W.732 (Intro. to Scientific and Technical Communication [yes, I realize I don't have to take this class because I passed the FEE, but I'm considering a major in 21W.2 (science writing) so cut me some slack]) until the night before. Both regarding an exhibit at the Boston Museum of Science, one is a critical review (like one that you'd find in a newspaper) and the other is an analytical report (like one an auditor would submit to the museum directors). Combined page total: ten.

Of course, I've managed to find some fantastic distractions. The classy class of 2012 had a mild flame war, complete with the usual literature and disgusting links to porn videos (aaahhh, the internets...), and naturally I had to check my facebook regularly. And now I'm blogging about wasting time, which is obviously the best solution...

Goal: be in bed by 5 AM. Wish me luck.

[Also, Watchmen comes out this weekend! Who's excited?!]

(Drumroll, Please!) Presenting the Collegiate Laundry Challenge!

2009-02-25T22:23:00.003-05:00

What you do:

DON'T do laundry for two months. Well, all you're allowed is two subsistence loads (subsistence load: your dirty jeans, and enough underwear and socks to make it until you have to do another of these loads).

What you'll discover when you finally do all (and I mean all) of your laundry at the end of the Challenge:

All that clothing you forgot you had? And all that clothing you thought you'd lost or left at home over break? It's really just in your laundry basket! It's like going shopping, but without spending any money! (This is great when you don't have a job/don't have time for a job - unless someone wants to pay me for blogging... Oh wait, that's right... Never mind.)

What you win:

Clean, nice-smelling clothes! Unfortunately, $4.50 will be taken out of your Tech Cash account for the three loads of laundry you have going simultaneously on three different floors, not to mention the time you have to take out of your day to sort, launder, and fold all of that laundry. On the night before a p-set is due (no, it really couldn't wait another day).

Moral of the story:

Having to do laundry sucks. I mean, I did my own laundry most of the time at home anyway, but it's slightly more painful here at college. I have to spend money on laundry that I could have spent on food (no, really, that $4.50 could have been a bagel and juice tomorrow morning), and I have to go to a million different floors so I can do multiple loads at one time. Also, letting it build up for two months is a REALLY BAD IDEA. I think I almost broke my laundry basket because it was so full. So kids, learn from my terrible mistakes and do your laundry!

The Chirality Game

2009-02-21T11:52:00.002-05:00

I'm working on studying for my 7.014 exam right now, and one of the study materials they suggest is called the Chirality Game.

I definitely expected some cheesy game, but I instead discovered the cutest chemistry-education game ever. You should definitely check it out - the snails are adorable, and now you'll never forget what chirality is! Nerdiness for the win.

Click here!

Playing Catch-Up: Part One

2009-02-19T15:17:00.008-05:00

I have officially been the worst blogger ever, and I sincerely apologize!!! IAP, the beginning of the spring semester, and extracurriculars have eaten up every spare moment I have, and unfortunately blogging hasn't been too high up on the priority list lately. Now that I have two p-sets due tomorrow (and I haven't started either one), blogging is suddenly the most important thing EVAR. Aaahhh, procrastination...

A lot of things have gone on since I last did a real update (not my "Ah! Look at this cool site so I can feel like I am actually posting something you'll want to read so I don't lose the meager readership I have because that would be lame! And I really don't want to be as lame as I already am!" posts), including the wonderfulness that is IAP, a couple of fantastic concerts, Pi Beta Phi recruitment (yes, a sorority...), and the first couple of weeks of my second semester here at MIT. Because this is a lot to cover, I'm going to split things up a bit. This is the first installment in a series of posts I'll be making over the next few days that cover what's been going on in my life so you know I'm not dying out here in Massachusetts, and that I can still form coherent (or somewhat coherent) sentences as proof that MIT hasn't completely broken me just yet.

So first thing's first: IAP!

IAP was amazing. I feel like I could have done more with my time, but I also feel like I could have relaxed more. In the end, I think relaxing was the better choice, because it made the start of the semester a little easier. So, here's what I did over IAP:

1. Darkroom photography class: I had blogged about this a little earlier, but that was in the middle of the class. It ended up being a very worthwhile class for me to take. I've had a fair amount of experience with darkrooms in the past, but it was a nice refresher, and I learned about printing with colored filters, which I had never done before. I still have a lot of photos I need to print, but this is one of my favorites that turned out even remotely well and is the product of many hours of frustration and many wasted pieces of photo paper:

2. Retaking 18.01: yeah, that didn't work out so well. I didn't do so well on one of the exams, so I ended up failing it again over IAP. As a result I'm retaking 18.01 again this term. I've accepted that I am just completely terrible at learning math, and it just takes me more time than most people. Oh well. Thank goodness MIT has such wonderful grading policies freshman year.

3. Debate Tournament: NorthAms is a debate tournament that happens every year, the title a shortening of "North Americans." Teams from a number of Canadian colleges that participate in CUSID and American colleges that have APDA teams gather either at an American or Canadian school (it switches every year - this year it was in Amherst, MA at Amherst College) for a debate tournament. The rules are this strange hybrid of CUSID and APDA styles, and to be perfectly honest I actually really like these rules. Unfortunately, I wasn't feeling too fantastic for most of the tournament, but I still had a good time, and it was fun to debate one last time before the insanity of the semester prevented me from doing so.

4. New York City trip: waking up at 5:30 AM, walking across campus in 14 degree F weather, sitting on a bus for three hours, and walking around in 12 degree F weather? Totally worth it. A group of friends and I went to New York the weekend of Mystery Hunt (we missed it, yes... lame, I know) and had an amazing time. We ate lunch at Becco, worked off all the calories from all the pasta we ate by walking to the Met through Central Park, saw only a fraction of the Met (favorite exhibits: Impressionism and contemporary photography), had life-changing chai lattes at Mud (and when I say "life-changing" I mean life-changing - I thought I knew what good chai tasted like, but the chai at Mud is so incredibly good it blew everything from back home out of the water), ate dinner at a little dumpling place, got cupcakes, and then caught the bus back home to Boston. It was a long day, but a fantastic one.

5. Andrew Bird Live!: ANDREW BIRD IS A GENIUS. I'm not even exaggerating! He is so incredibly talented, it's ridiculous. Loney Dear (and no, I did not misspell that!), a Swedish group, opened with a great set, and I definitely think they are much better live than they are in their recordings. Bird's set was fantastic; he played mostly songs from Noble Beast, but threw in "Imitosis" off of Armchair Apocrypha and "Tables and Chairs" off of ... And the Mysterious Production of Eggs (one of my favorite albums of all time). The show was the last Friday of IAP at the Orpheum Theater in Boston. Oddly enough, the Orpheum has seating. I'd never seen a show while sitting down before, and it was kind of strange. The show also got over at about 11 or 11:30 or so, which is the earliest any show I've ever been to has ended. Enough of my blabbering, here are pictures! The first one is Loney Dear, and the rest are Andrew Bird.
There was a review article in The Tech, but I can't say it was a good article. Not only is Loney Dear misspelled (just a little pet peeve of mine), the author clearly didn't do her research (the custom built gramophones are just for this tour, as one example...). Overall, I don't think it did the show, or Andrew Bird, any justice. Though he really did take his boots off and perform in pink socks, and there were so many hipsters there it was a bit like Urban Outfitters and American Apparel decided to have a convention with all their models.

So that was my IAP. When I wasn't doing one of the things listed above, I was hanging out with friends watching movies!

Now, for a video from Nerdist for G4, all about MIT's Mystery Hunt:

(I don't know why he keeps calling it "Puzzle Hunt" because that is definitely not what it's called... Oh well... This is the price of a bit more fame for MIT, I suppose?)

And I just can't resist linking to this article about movie projects involving things like vampires, Elton John, and Jane Austen novels. It's just too fabulous.
Plus, you should reward yourself for reading this much of this post. It was really long. Sorry about that! There was just so much to cover...

A Biology Nerd's Holiday

2009-02-12T15:51:00.002-05:00

[Again, I will have a real post coming soon! I just couldn't pass this up!]

HAPPY BIRTHDAY DARWIN!

As a complete and total nerd for biology, today is a pretty fantastic day. It's Darwin's 200th birthday... I might just dust off my copy of The Origin of Species and do some light reading today. Oh wait, p-sets are killing me. Just kidding.

The Origin of Darwin (New York Times article)

More coming soon...

2009-02-09T19:32:00.004-05:00

GUESS WHAT?!

This Saturday is a holiday! Well, two holidays, to be precise!

Not only is it Valentine's Day, it's also the 150th anniversary of Oregon's statehood!

In honor of the state that spawned Kettle Chips and Tonya Harding, my radio show tonight will consist entirely of music from Oregon bands!!! So, show Oregon some love and listen in!

http://wmbr.org at 10 PM PST/1 AM EST, 9/10 February!

And I will do a real update soon, I promise! I have to blog about IAP, concerts, and spring term, so that's what you have to look forward to! This week is looking like it's going to be a little hectic, so I can't say when I'll be posting again, but I will try to make it soon.

In the meantime, here's a nerdy video featuring music by The Fall and chemistry. I officially love the EU.

Home State... Pride?

2009-01-29T23:40:00.004-05:00

I won't deny it: I love Oregon.

Naturally, I get pretty excited when Oregon comes up in the national news arena. I'm always so pleased when I see my home state portrayed as something other than a land of meth addicts and crazies. However, things appear to have gone to crap since I left. (Okay, me leaving and moving to Boston clearly has no impact on the behavior of the citizens of the Beaver State. I recognize this... Just go with it.)

First off, there's the scandal business with Portland's newest mayor, Sam Adams. The local news stations have been buzzing about it for a while, and it's now made several appearances on the New York Times website.

"The Great Gay Hope" - Timothy Egan Blog

Portland Journal: A Mayor’s Lie Throws a City Into Turmoil

What it boils down to is this: Adams lied about his relationship with a significantly younger male in his campaign for the mayoral seat (the issue is not that this relationship was with a male - Portland is the largest city with an openly gay mayor in the US - it's the age differences). He's since come clean about it, and a large number of his former supporters are calling for his resignation (they can't recall just yet - Portland has a law that you can't recall a mayor for the first six months they are in office), which he has refused to do. In my opinion, Adams has done the right thing. Honestly, I don't think it's impairing his ability to lead the city in any way, and there are politicians out there that have committed far more egregious acts and we've allowed them to remain in office. Obviously we shouldn't be letting this slide, because it could be seen as a condonation of behavior we don't really want to see from a mayor, but if the man can actually do a good job of leading the Rose City, then I think we should let him.

Secondly, there's some crazy CIA stuff going on. Apparently, a man and his son from Eugene have been caught committing espionage and selling information to the Russians.

CIA Spy Enlisted Son to Collect Espionage Debts, Feds Say

I think the father is held at the Federal Correction Institution in Sheridan, judging from the article. Which is kind of weird. That's definitely only about ten miles away from my house. I guess this article isn't as interesting or controversial as the ones about Sam Adams, but it's interesting in that it went on so close to where I lived...

---

Back here in Boston, things are going quite well. IAP is swiftly coming to an end (Registration Day is Monday! AH!) and spring semester is starting next Tuesday. Things I have to worry about are shifting from dividing time between sleeping, hanging out, what movie to watch next, studying and eating, to class schedules, study habits, studying, eating, and more studying. IAP has been a lot of fun, but I think I'm (sort of) ready for the semester to begin. I just want to get it over with. Then there's the problem of figuring out what to do with my summer. And camp is no longer an option, for a number of reasons. Hopefully I'll get something figured out...

Happy Birthday, Jesse!

2009-01-16T17:02:00.004-05:00

It's my brother's 15th birthday today! In honor of this, I naturally have to post cutesy baby pictures of him that I just know he will appreciate. Okay everyone, on the count of three... Awwww!

I would just like to point out that this kid is now a good five inches taller than I am. I would also like to point out that I am sort of thankful I'm not going to be on the roads back home - Jesse can officially get his permit now.

In other news: IAP is in full swing here. I still have a concussion, and it hurts a lot. I finally have access to the darkroom in the student center, and I finally managed to make a decent print with a negative that I was having some difficulties with. And now I need a nap.

[Happy Birthday, Jesse!!!]

Why I Fail (Or, a Quick Tutorial in Klutziness)

2009-01-12T15:21:00.002-05:00

Freshman year of high school, I broke my wrist while playing basketball in P.E. I tripped over my own two feet, and in a vain attempt to stop the most epic face-plant ever, I put my right hand out. My extended arm did nothing to slow down the gravitational pull from the earth/glossy gym floor and my face. I ended up with a broken wrist, skinned knees, and a significantly smaller amount of dignity.

The summer after my sophomore year of high school, I was showing a goat at Polk County Fair for FFA. While I was running over to the animal barns to meet a friend of mine who was visiting, I jumped over a cable fence (the cable was about a foot off the ground), and didn't quite clear it; my foot caught and I ended up face-planting... again. This time, I knew better than to stick my right arm out to stop my fall. This time, I put my left arm out. Turns out, my left arm is no more effective at fighting gravity than my right arm. Once I caught my breath (I had the wind knocked out of me, too) and joined my friends, they took me to the Red Cross tent. Later that evening, they were prescribing me Vicodin in the Emergency Room and making me a splint.

My latest fall/failure at staying upright: Saturday night. I was walking across Brigg's Field toward Simmons, treading carefully on the ice-pack and fresh powder that had accumulated. I had gone about thirty feet, when my feet were no longer underneath me and I landed flat on my back. I also did a bang-up job (no pun intended... okay, maybe it was intended) and hit my head. I was completely conscious, so I got up and continued my trek (though with a lot more care). All day Sunday, and today (Monday), I had a monstrous headache. It's been sound- and light-sensitive, and I've basically been a little out of it. A quick trip to Medical this afternoon resulted in a diagnosis of "concussion" and instructions to take it easy and buy a bottle of Excedrin. The beautiful combination of acetaminophen, aspirin and caffeine has helped significantly, however.

I think these three anecdotes successfully support the claim that I am a complete klutz. I think they also show that I am completely shameless regarding my klutziness because I definitely just published three embarrassing stories about myself on the internet for the whole world to read. Fabulous. Well, klutziness for the win.

Culture Shock

2009-01-07T20:55:00.003-05:00

Okay, you'll realize in about five seconds why that was the worst pun in a title EVER.

I'm on the Tillamook Fan Club website again!

(Tillamook makes cheese. Get it? Cheese? Culture? *sigh*)

Anyway.

So, turns out they don't have bots posting things; they have robot interns! And these robot interns have a sense of humor! So humorous are they that I am once again on their online buzz page on their website. It also appears that my site was passed around the office or something, judging by the increase in Portland readers in my Sitemeter statistics.

Lost? It's okay. It all started with this, and continues here and here.

Also on the interwebs: my MIT Admissions Guest Blog (courtesy of Snively - thanks!!!).

In other news... It's IAP at MIT! Basically, that means the next month is going to be full of fun awesome-ness (and I think I'm going to spend some time concentrating on expanding my vocabulary...). I'm re-taking 18.01 (don't ask) and I'm also taking a darkroom photography class. The photo class is going well - I'm halfway through it right now. It's a refresher course for me (I started playing around with 35 mm cameras and darkrooms about five and a half years ago, but I haven't been in a darkroom in a while) and it's strange to realize just how much I missed the darkroom. Today we went through the film development process, and it was kind of funny how the smell of developer and fixer triggered so many memories of working in the darkroom at Sheridan High School for hours on end, only emerging to eat lunch. Included in the class fee is darkroom access for the whole month. Essentially, I'm going to be spending a lot of time in there (when I'm not enjoying all the other amazing things going on around campus and Boston).

Winter Break by the Numbers

2009-01-03T16:09:00.006-05:00

Total approximate accumulative snowfall at my house from December 17th to January 3rd: 40 inches

Total number of times I left my house the first week: 3

Total number of days spent without electricity: 7

Total number of days I was thankful for our small generator that powers a few outlets and our water pump: 7

Total number of Dutch Brothers coffee drinks consumed: 8

Percentage of Dutch Brothers drinks that were Kahlua Kickers: 50%

Percentage of Dutch Brothers drinks that were Chai Lattes: 25%

Percentage of Dutch Brothers drinks that were Jet Tea Smoothies: 25%

Total Number of Visits to Cornerstone Coffee: 3

Total Number of Visits to Starbucks: 0

Number of bowling games completed: 1

Bowling score: 61 (yep, I suck)

Number of times I ate at Shari's: 2

I just want to know who got Mother Nature pissed off at Oregon. Really. I mean, we generally get a big snow storm every year, but this was just insane. At most we get about a foot at my house (we're ~1,300 feet about sea-level in the Coast Range), but we tripled that. Down in Willamina, which is on the valley floor, they had a considerable amount of snow, and roads were even closed!

Basically, the snow did a dandy job of messing up my winter break. Being stuck in my house for a week meant that I really didn't see anyone during that first week... I saw my friend Anna when her family came up to get a Christmas tree from our field, and my friend Kari when we went to the Casino for Christmas dinner because we didn't have power. Fortunately, my friend Natalie came and rescued me and I got to spend some time in Corvallis.

The snow finally was starting to melt off by the second week of break. I was able to go places and see people without having to worry whether my little '95 Saturn SL2 would make it up the hills to my house due to ice.

And then Mother Nature got a sense of (very cruel) humor. By January 1st, a good portion of the now had melted. What does a sudden increase in water runoff mean? Flooding! Which means that a number of towns on the coast (i.e. Tillamook) and towns that are in floodplains (i.e. Sheridan and Willamina) either got flooded, or spent the night worrying about the rising water levels (really - there were sand bags in front of a lot of businesses the next morning). January 2nd brought snow to my house. On my last night home, I met some friends at Shari's, and on my way back, I managed to maneuver my car so it was perpendicular to the road. Well, I didn't manage this all by myself, I had a considerable (and I mean considerable) amount of help from ice on a hill. The next morning, when my family piled into the car to take me to the airport, we nearly ended up in the ditch going around a corner, thanks to a particularly slick spot.

I realize that I got to school in Boston, where the weather is incredibly crappy, so I shouldn't really complain. But weather like that never happens in Oregon. We get a "bad" storm every year that just dumps about a foot of snow, and then we're done. I was totally prepared to head home to the usual 45-degrees-and-raining weather that western Oregon is famous for. Thanks for the wonderful "Welcome home!," Oregon. The only upside was how beautiful it all was (well, for the first five seconds):

Post of the Day

2008-12-24T14:48:00.004-05:00

I fail to understand.

Somehow, my original post that mentioned Tillamook Cheese is the "Post of the Day" on the Tillamook Cheese fan club website.

I am by no means complaining, I'm just kind of confused. Has no one over there at the Tillamook fan club headquarters actually read my blog? Do they realize that I don't have anything to offer the cheese-lovers of the world? Or is it just some bot putting it up? It's definitely freaking me out, not going to lie.

Weather Update: It's currently raining and it's really windy. Which is awesome. Trees are dropping snow like there's no tomorrow. I might actually be able to leave my house soon. We also might get power back soon. Hopefully the weather isn't instilling a false sense of hope. Because that would be cruel.

Happy holidays everyone! I doubt I'll be posting tomorrow, as I'll be dealing with the usual Christmas merriness, visiting family and all that jazz, so I hope you all have a great Christmas (or whatever holiday you choose to celebrate) in advance!

Say Cheese!

2008-12-23T15:04:00.005-05:00

My dear and faithful readers, I have a question for you.

Do I exploit the Tillamook Cheese fan club website?

I suppose I should explain. See, in my last post, I described my experience with making a grilled cheese sandwich using Tillamook Cheese. I believe I described the bread and cheese combination as "perfect." Going through my sitemeter statistics this morning, I discovered something.

That thing off on the sidebar that looks like a speech bubble? The link at the top of it?

A link to my blog.

A few more people (okay, two so far) have visited my blog because of this link from the Tillamook Cheese fan club website.

So, do I exploit this? Do I exploit the fact that this site will link to my blog if I mention how wonderful Tillamook Cheese is? I'm thinking I should. I mean, I feel bad because I have nothing to offer these poor souls that just want to read about cheese and instead happen upon my blog chronicling the live of a student at MIT. And MIT is hopelessly devoid of Tillamook Cheese. Maybe these new readers will take pity on me and find a way to get Tillamook Cheese to Boston (because, frankly, this "Vermont Cheddar" business just ain't cuttin' it). I think the most I could offer these people are a few comical anecdotes and a picture of my sandwich.
But I could get increased exposure for my blog. Which is always preferred, right? So I think I'm going to do it. All I have to do is mention how AWESOME Tillamook Cheese is in every blog post, and then I'll be linked to a lot on their site and then more hits for Kelsey-Pedia!

In other news...
This was after some snow had melted a little. Our neighbor says he measured 36 inches of snow in one spot. And it's snowing again right now. And we still don't have power. And I'm still complaining.

Basically, this is getting really old.

[Oh, and sorry for the tiny pictures. I'm on a slow internet connection.]

I'm Baaaaaack!

2008-12-21T17:00:00.000-05:00

First: Kelsey-Pedia is exactly one year old! Well, as of yesterday. Also, this is the 100th post! whoo! It's kind of amazing that I've managed to keep this going for a year now, and it's looking like it'll be continuing into 2009!

Second: I am back in Oregon!

I am very lucky that I left when I did. I flew back on Thursday - if I had left just a day later, I would have been dealing with snow in Boston delaying flights, and snow in Oregon delaying flights. I don't know how excited I am to be back, though.

Why's that?

This was taken early this afternoon. We've been hit with a lot more snow since then. Essentially, I am snowed in. If we want to leave, we have to put chains on my dad's truck and plan for about an extra hour of travel time. So I'm stuck. Which really messes up my plans - I really wanted to see friends all over the Willamette Valley before I fly back in two weeks. I really wanted to go visit a few of my favorite places and eat some of my favorite food before going back to MIT. I just really need this damn snow to melt. And melt all the way - none of this melt-a-little-and-form-a-layer-of-ice-that-could-be-
used-as-tank-armor-until-you-unexpectedly-crash-through-
and-bruise-your-shins crap.

Oh, and let's not forget the icing on the cake! We don't have power! Well, I guess that's a bit of a lie. My house has a propane-powered generator, so we have a couple of outlets that have power, and our refrigerator and well water pump have power. So I am currently hogging one of those outlets, using my laptop and the nifty little wireless internet card my dad got (right after I left for MIT! How cruel is that?). We also fortunately have a wood stove in part of the house, so we have the wonderfulness that is heat from a fire permeating through the house. This also means that I can flaunt my skills as a Girl Scout by making grilled cheese (perfect grilled cheese with Tillamook cheese, might I add... Oh, Tillamook cheese, how I have missed you...). I'm trying omelettes tomorrow morning for breakfast. Basically, I would have been a badass on the American frontier.

It's a strange feeling to not have work looming over my head. No p-sets? No papers? No upcoming tests? I don't know what to do with my time! I've been sleeping a lot. And sitting on Facebook way more than is healthy. I've also been reading, which I haven't done in a long time. I read all but about 20 pages of Watchmen in a day, and I have a huge stack of other books I need to finish. All while listening to excessive amounts of the Decemberists. (Who, by the way, have a new album coming out on March 24th that I am unbelievably excited for! And you should be too, because it will no doubt be amazing.) While it's nice to relax a little, I am actually excited for IAP and spring semester. I think I learned a lot about study skills over the course of the last term (looking back, I had zero study skills before MIT) and I'd like the chance to prove that I can use them and be successful at MIT. Because now I actually think I can do really really well at MIT. And I suddenly have to motivation to do so. Maybe I just needed to shake the senioritis from high school? Who knows... Regardless, I am excited to get back and get started. Plus, I really miss MIT in general. I think I realize just how much I love the place when I'm somewhere else. Being stuck at home means I'm relegated to AIM conversations with people, and texting or calling them. Which isn't bad, but simply doesn't replace walking across the hall (or Briggs field) to hang out with friends and be with people. I also miss the stress (weird, I know... but I thrive on stress) and having something definite to do every day. Don't get me wrong - I'm happy to be home. I've really missed the people and places here, but it's pretty exciting to have fallen in love with a place that you've made a conscious decision to go to.

I'll make sure to post more about my adventures (or lack thereof) over winter break. Next possible chance for misadventure: I have to go to Salem tomorrow for an eye appointment, and I desperately need to go (things are getting fuzzy, even with the glasses on!). Tomorrow's going to be a long day. And pictures of the snow madness will be coming soon!

Good luck to all of you in Oregon dealing with the snow and ice, and happy holidays to everyone!

Studying Madness

2008-12-12T20:53:00.002-05:00

Let me just put this out there:

I hate chemistry.

Really. It's ridiculous. I'm definitely making progress in re-learning this material for the final, but I still hate it. I only have until Tuesday to study, and suddenly this is a terrifyingly daunting task. I'm studying for three three-hour long tests right now, and the sheer weight of that has just hit me. I have SO MUCH TO DO!

AH!

Basically, I just need to study nonstop for the remainder of the weekend. Fortunately (or perhaps unfortunately, depending on how you look at it) I have peanut butter blossom cookies to get me through the madness. I have seriously been eating them (and the Hershey's kisses left over because I bought a huge bag) in unhealthily large quantities all afternoon - this is what happens when you help your friends bake massive amounts of delicious cookies from scratch. They are unbelievably delicious...

And...
Less than a week until I am home!!!

A Dangerous Discovery

2008-12-08T03:19:00.004-05:00

I just discovered something amazing/terrible.

Amazing because I love it.

Terrible because I discovered this right before finals.

I can watch Twin Peaks online.

This is almost as cool as discovering that I could have David Lynch tell me what the weather in LA is doing on a daily basis.

While I am really excited about this, there are several disappointing things about the whole situation:

I have to study for finals.
They don't have the pilot episode online, so if you don't know/remember what happened in that one, then you're kind of screwed.
The quality is terrible.
I have to study for finals some more.
I have to pass my finals with flying colors.

And because finals are coming up and I REALLY need to study, I probably won't be able to post until my last final is over on Wednesday the 17th. I really apologize for that, but I desperately need to pass.

So, more in a week or so!

Proof that Blogging is Awesome

2008-12-01T16:19:00.002-05:00

Guess whose radiator is working?!?!?!

Oh yes, that would be mine.

Still no hot water though. But today was really warm (57 degrees!) so it's sort of okay.

C'mon Simmons, hot water, please?

Dear Simmons,

2008-12-01T09:51:00.003-05:00

Hi there! I'm a resident of your lovely structure (but you already know that) and I feel it's time we had a little chat.

See, I've lived here since mid-August and I've noticed a disturbing pattern develop. First there was the complete lack of heat in my room that I share with my roommate, Tess. Then there was the extremely random exploding toilet incident where Stunes had to loan us a screwdriver if we wanted to be able to flush the toilet. After that, I thought we were okay again.

But now I'm convinced you're trying to kill me.

Yes, I realize that was a ballsy accusation, but let me explain. For the past two weeks, my side of the room has been completely without heat. You've decided to ignore my radiator, while Tess's burbles pleasantly on the other side of the room. Considering the arrangement of our room, which doesn't allow heat to really flow to my side of the room from Tess's, I'd say you're exploiting the situation. While my friend Joanna was here, you were well-behaved and my radiator was radiating warm wonderfulness. But as soon as Joanna was about to leave Saturday, that radiator was dead. And now, not only is my radiator dead, but there's no hot water in our bathroom! It started Saturday when you must have realized Joanna was about to go back to her school, and it's still a hot water-less bathroom. Well, I take that back. There's hot water coming out of the faucet, but certainly not out of the shower head.

Really, Simmons? REALLY? I mean, I think it was really nice of you to be on your best behavior while a guest was here, but I think that was more so there weren't any witnesses or something. I'm convinced that you're trying to induce hypothermia and kill me. You certainly didn't pull this in August, when I would have been totally okay with it. Noooo, you have to do it in December when it's cold out. Honestly, it's just a little ridiculous. I don't shower with ice water by choice. And I'm sure my neighbors don't appreciate me shouting expletives every time I have to take one of the freezing cold showers.

I'm not really sure what I did wrong. Was it the small insults about your architectural flaws? Was it laughing at all your weirdness? Was it complaining about all your inefficiencies? I can imagine that it might have made you a little insecure, and I'm sorry, but aren't the hordes of architects scrambling to tour you enough of an ego boost to make up for all my bashing? I can't have been responsible for that much ego-bruising.

Well, whatever it is, I'm sorry. I'll do whatever it takes to make this right again. Just let me know what I can do, and then will you please stop trying to kill me? Thanks!

Sincerely yours,

Kelsey K
Simmons Resident

[So, I know that someone is going to suggest that something is wrong with the central heating system. But will you please explain to me why just my heater isn't working? And why just our shower is completely incapable of producing hot water? "Simmons is trying to kill me" just works.]

"Your Dorm Feels Like OMSI"

2008-11-27T22:34:00.000-05:00

Okay, so sorry that I don't have a decent post planned... I'm just kind of writing randomly...

First off, HAPPY THANKSGIVING! I hope you all have had a sufficiently awesome holiday, and I hope you all had delicious dinners! I myself am spending Thanksgiving here at MIT with my friend Joanna, who's visiting from her school in Vermont (I know her from home, though...)! Essentially, I'm super-pumped that she's here. It's kind of amusing to compare our two schools - we have a nuclear reactor, they have some solar panels on their barn. Their dorms feel like cabins, my dorm feels like OMSI (the Oregon Museum of Science and Industry). It's hilarious.

After I was released from the horrors of classes on the day before Thanksgiving (OH NOES! Okay, it was only an hour of 5.111 because everything else I had was canceled), Joanna and I headed to Harvard Square to go to Eastern Mountain Sports. At Joanna's school, they go on some intense camping trips in the mountains of Vermont in December, so she needed some gear. While there, I discovered that everything was on sale! I really needed a better winter coat that could protect me from the ridiculous wind here, so a purchase was soon made, and I am now a warmer human being. They didn't have everything she needed, so it was off to R.E.I., down by Fenway. After spending some time on the T, and walking back over the Harvard Bridge, we were successfully back at MIT. Then we went grocery shopping, which was awesome, because I really needed food.

Today was spent exploring campus, and then we came back to Simmons for a delicious delicious Thanksgiving dinner. The table settings looked amazing, and there were a lot of people there! After dinner and a call home, there was a movie in the MPR (Simmons' Multi-Purpose Room).

Sorry about the crappy pictures, I only had my cell phone with me!

Happy Thanksgiving everyone! I hope you all enjoyed a day off, especially you MIT students - I hope you enjoyed your day off from p-sets! (Please tell me you took a day off from p-sets...)

The Miracles of Modern Technology

2008-11-19T16:23:00.002-05:00

I am incredibly absent-minded.

Like, beyond reason.

I misplace, forget, or lose things all the time. The most recent victim of my forgetfulness?

My ID card.

I definitely lost it the other day when I put it in my pocket after buying some food at the student center. When I tried to get into Simmons later that day... I had some issues. After searching through every bag I have ever used, every jacket pocket, and the places I went in the student center, I came to the terrible conclusion that I had flat out lost it.

Unfortunately, Card Services closes at 4:30, so I didn't have a chance to get a new one yesterday. But, after spending five minutes at Card Services (that was a lot less time than I was expecting) I walked out with a new ID card.

So I would like to sincerely whoever came up with the little machine that churned out my ID card so quickly. You are my hero.

I would also like to thank whatever gem of technology is responsible for making my radiator worthless. I have it turned up all the way, and it's still cold. Which makes me really happy considering it is currently 31 degrees here, and the low tonight is supposed to be 21 degrees. And my dorm is a giant hunk of concrete and metal.

[Three days of the worst week ever completed! Now I just need to worry about a presentation and an exam! YEA!]

And We're Supposed to be Sad?

2008-11-17T15:49:00.003-05:00

No more TRL!

I suppose the show contributed to the development of pop music, but I can't say that I can think of many people that I know that are completely heart-broken over this (and I am certainly not).

In other news... it's getting cold here! My weather widget on my computer is telling me the lows for this next week are going to be in the 20s, and the high on Friday is supposed to 38 degrees. Back home, the highs are in the 50s and the lows are in the 40s. Essentially, I miss the Pacific Ocean.

Okay, I'll stop complaining.

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Update on Life

2008-11-15T12:29:00.011-05:00

So, I realize it's been a while since I've blogged about the amazingness that is MIT... Or anything else going on in my life. Which is kind of pathetic, I will agree. I guess I'll just do a massive update, and have it over with. Sorry if this gets really long and verbose...

Classes
Ehhhhh... Yeah. Classes. Well, they're going all right I suppose. I'm actually understanding calculus right now, and could see myself doing really well on the final. Which is a fabulous feeling. What's not looking good is this next week: two exams, a paper, and a presentation. Obviously, I'm not too worried about the presentation or paper (I'm actually incredibly excited for them), but those two exams are going to kill me. I realize that this probably isn't a bad week in the cases of most MIT students, but oh well. I'm just happy that everything isn't quite as overwhelming as it was earlier in the semester.

National Convention
So, I realized I never blogged about Nationals, other than to say what result we got. I apologize for that. Basically, Nationals was a fun time, though a bit stressful. It was nice/strange to see people from home, and nice/strange to be off campus for a week. By the end of the week, I found myself missing MIT, so that was a good sign. Because pictures are worth a thousand words, I'm going to save some space and just post some pictures from the trip instead.

We found these in Chicago. AMAZING.

Chicago was pretty, but cold.

We visited a grain elevator in Indiana, where they had ridiculous amounts of corn and fertilizer.

They took us up on the catwalk above their fertilizer storage, where they have a conveyor belt set up. The stairs and catwalk itself were rather rickety, and it was a terrifying experience...

The current US Secretary of Agriculture, Ed Schafer, spoke at one of the convention sessions. He gave a great speech, which included the line, "I felt the excitement in the halls all night long." The entire crowd exploded with laughter when he said that, and he definitely had to wait a few moments before he could speak again. I love it when politicians provide you with "That's what she said" moments (e.g. Sarah Palin's "Drill baby, drill!" line during the vice-presidential debate).
Our team walked away with this! It's kind of sad it doesn't say that we got third on it...
Our super-happy team in Monument Circle in Indianapolis. We were on our way to get ice cream right after the awards banquet.
So, for some reason, I was the only Ag Communications participant to show up to the final session to be recognized on the national stage (I even changed my flight back to MIT to be able to do so) so I was the only one up there with the national officers. It was totally worth it. Oh, and they messed up the plaque they gave me (it had the name of the girl who was third high individual in Ag Sales... oddly enough, her name is Kelsey as well...) so they're sending me another one...

Movies
I've watched a ridiculous number of movies lately. All on the weekends, but still. A ridiculous number of them.
Including...
Yes, you're reading that correctly. Quantum of Solace... at midnight. Awesome, I know. It was a pretty good movie, and I recommend seeing it for the action (certainly not the plot). That, and James Bond is just plain awesome. I also finally saw The Dark Knight last night, thanks to LSC! I thought the movie was just a lot of hype over the summer, but it lived up to its reputation. It was amazingly good. And I can now see why some people saw it multiple times...

Politics
Gordon Smith lost. The school bond failed. Okay, we're all on the same page now...

Life in General
Overall, things are going quite well. This weekend will be spent doing fun things with friends (and studying for those two tests), and there's a chance I'll be in New York next weekend. Thanksgiving is quickly approaching, which means that my friend Joanna will be coming down from her school in Vermont to visit me! I am ridiculously excited. Anyway. After Thanksgiving will be finals, and then I CAN GO HOME. Fortunately, my finals are on the Tuesday and Wednesday of Finals Week, so I am on the first flight home on Thursday. Thank you Dad for scoring those tickets.

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Help WMBR Out...

2008-11-11T00:24:00.004-05:00

It's the 2008 Fundraiser here at WMBR (wmbr.org)!

Help support independent college radio by pledging your support HERE. It'd be really awesome of you. There are premiums to thank you for your support, but the bigger gift is knowing you're helping WMBR out! Help us reach our goal (of $70,000!!!)!

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Election Update

2008-11-05T10:59:00.007-05:00

Like I said before, I wasn't really partial to either candidate (I liked McCain for some reasons, and disliked him for some reasons. I liked Obama for some reasons and disliked him other reasons.), but I will say that things are kind of exciting. Maybe it's because it was one of the most historic elections in American history (if not THE most historic), and I got to participate.

So, some updates on election results. I think we've all heard this:

Source: www.nytimes.com

As for the local results back home, things are still close. I guess they're pretty much done counting votes there, but I am still holding out hope for the school bond.

Senate race:

Source: www.katu.com

Yes, I know the votes are still pretty close. And as of 12:05 AM PST, they still hadn't counted votes in Multnomah County. So this should be interesting.

Source: www.katu.com

School Bond: [The Statesman Journal website was the same as it was last night, so I think KATU's results are a little bit more accurate. Sorry for the change in resources!]

Source: www.katu.com

I don't think we have to worry about double-majority with this anymore, because double-majority has screwed over the school district's attempts at passing a bond before, but I sincerely hope that it wins. There's really a small difference in votes, but I guess when you consider the size of the community voting, 97 votes is kind of a considerable margin. Which is really sad. The results haven't been officially called it looks like, so I am still holding onto that one small shred of hope I have that my community back home will be smart and pass the school bond because school facilities are simply not adequate. If it fails, I might just write another letter to the editor of the paper back home. Maybe instead of it taking up four or five columns, I'll aim for six or seven this time.

Election Madness!

2008-11-05T00:40:00.005-05:00

Oh man, we have a new president!

I wasn't super-intense about either candidate, but I will say that Obama's speech was amazing. But his speeches are always amazing. I can't even begin to understand how he can be such an amazing public speaker.

While I was excited for the national election, I was really anxious for results of local elections back home. And thanks to the time difference I had to wait for FOREVER. But now some of them are being posted on certain news websites! YEA.

Okay, let me just say that I will be really unhappy if the Willamina School bond fails by 20 votes. 20 votes!!! I will be so disappointed in people!

Source: www.statesmanjournal.com

When it comes to the race for Senate back home in Oregon, it's been a vicious one. But I definitely wholeheartedly support Gordon Smith. Basically he's a moderate who's actually accomplished things in Congress that are good for the nation and Oregon (like timber payments making their way back to counties of origin! Yea! Thank you Senator Smith!). I met him at our state FFA convention last year, and he's also a really nice guy. Here's how the race looked a few minutes ago:

Source: www.katu.com

I will update more tomorrow!

AHHH.

I really hope that you all voted, if you could vote.

To the New York Times

2008-11-03T18:19:00.004-05:00

I think you're a little slow on the uptake.

Just sayin'. This has also happened in the dairy cattle and banana industries. Funny, huh? And I think you say pretty much the same about any domesticated species, especially ones that use a lot of artificial insemination in production.

Congratulations.

And now, to lighten things up a smidge:

One-Two, "Something in my Mind"

Walking on Air

2008-10-24T22:16:00.002-04:00

I am currently in a state of complete shock, so I won't be really verbose with this. In fact, I won't even use many complete sentences.

National FFA Convention
Agricultural Communications CDE 2008

Willamina FFA - 3rd place team
-Alyssa: Gold Individual
-Anna: Gold Individual
-Spencer: Silver Individual
-Katie: Silver Individual

-Kelsey: Gold Individual, 3rd high individual

Yep, I was the third high individual. I was definitely not expecting it, and I started crying in front of a little over 200 people at the awards banquet. I got a scholarship, and will be walking across the National stage during session tomorrow.

Wanna watch? It's going to be on TV!
RFD-TV. 1-5 p.m. (EDT) (Though I'll be on anywhere between 1:15 and 1:45). Channel 231 on Dish Network, 379 on Direct TV, and available on a number of other providers.
While the session is long, I recommend watching some of it, because it's really quite amazing how large the FFA is and just how amazing it all is.

[Sorry for all the misspellings and odd capitalization - I'm a little out of it right now.]

D-Day

2008-10-22T09:20:00.004-04:00

Today, it begins.

We start the National FFA Agricultural Communications contest here in Indianapolis, and I am beginning to get a little nervous. I was just reminded that this will be my last-ever FFA contest, so I'm a little sad, but a little excited to make it a good one!

Our room is littered with empty Denny's to-go trays from 2 AM and there are papers and notecards everywhere with random things on them regarding natural disasters and Associated Press editing marks. We've been memorizing our presentation, frantically cutting from our speeches to make time, and plotting to win. This room is a disaster, and we've only been here one night - frenzied last-minute work will do that!

I won't give updates for the next couple of days, mostly because I'll be concentrating on competing. In fact, I really should be working on perfecting my "big hair" right now with a can of hairspray rather than blogging. Results will be announced Friday evening at a dinner, so that's when I will blog next!

I Smell Like A Hog Farm

2008-10-21T17:44:00.002-04:00

Hello from America's heartland!

We toured a hog farm and a grain elevator today. It was awesome (my favorite part was the grain elevator) but now I smell like a hog farm. We all smell like a hog farm.

Take 14 people that smell like hogs and put them in a 15-passenger van.

It doesn't exactly smell fantastic.

This trip is going well though! Chicago was amazing, though I had to work on stuff through most of it so I missed the Chicago Board of Trade and the Sears tower. We're back in Indianapolis now, and our competition starts tomorrow! I'm beginning to get a little nervous, but we always pull through in the end so I think we'll be all right and do really well!

Okay, I'm off to go memorize my parts for our presentation! I'll post some pictures later this week, if I have some time (free time? such a strange concept...).

LOLZ

2008-10-18T14:55:00.001-04:00

Ew. Just typing that felt icky.

Anyway!

This is pretty amazing.

Just sayin'.

[Oh, and hello from Indianapolis!]

T-minus 15 Hours

2008-10-17T19:14:00.002-04:00

In 15 hours I'll be on a plane headed toward Indianapolis!

YEA!

It's going to be amazing! I am really excited for National Convention this year. I think it'll be a good change of pace, and Nationals always gets me really motivated (which I could really use right now).

Okay, I really need to pack.... And I hate packing. :(

So apparently...

2008-10-14T10:45:00.002-04:00

... my foot's not broken!

YEA!

Well, that's what they tell me. They told me that I probably just have some obscenely [okay, my word, not theirs... but that's how painful it is] bad tendonitis and that I just need to take lots of ibuprofen and ice it. I just really hope that they didn't misdiagnose. Because that wouldn't be fun. I'm still in a lot of pain though, which means I'll be going through a lot of ibuprofen.

Oh man, I really need my foot to be better before next week.

:(

Update on ze Foot

2008-10-13T22:05:00.002-04:00

So I decided on Friday night/Saturday morning that I would go to MIT Medical if my foot was still hurting on Sunday evening. Because I am a lame person (no pun intended)/tend to ignore damaged limbs for longer than I should, I didn't go to Medical on Sunday night, despite the fact that my foot hurts like none other.

Tonight I went down to the ground floor of Simmons to get some ice because that really helped earlier this weekend. By the time I got back up to the tenth floor, I was in some major pain. I had definitely waited too long. I stuffed the bags of ice I had gotten into the small freezer box in the mini fridge in my room, grabbed some homework and my laptop, and headed out to trek over to Medical.

I hobbled over there, and before I knew it I was in an exam room, having a doctor poking my foot (it went a lot faster than I expected). Now, while I was slowly making my way to the complete opposite end of campus where Medical is, I was once again trying to think of what could be making my foot hurt this bad. And then I remembered.

I stubbed my toe.

Yep. I don't remember what it was I stubbed my toe on, but I distinctly remember being in a lot of pain, nearly crying, then telling myself to suck it up and deal with it.

The doctor at Medical asked me the usual questions:
"What's wrong?"
"Well, my foot really hurts..."
"How long has it been hurting?"
"Since last weekend, but it's gotten a lot more intense the past four days or so..."
*pokepokepoke*
*ouchouchouch*
"I really don't know why it would be hurting right there..."
"Maybe I could have sprained it? Though I don't really know how..."
"Have you had any trauma to the area?"
"Well, I did stub my toe pretty hard last weekend, but I didn't really think much of it..."
"Well... that would do it... I'll order x-rays, and you can go to radiology tomorrow anytime after 9 AM."

So they think I might have broken my foot. Which is an epic fail, because I am on my feet a lot here. Everything is at least a 15 minute walk away, or upstairs. Oh, and a week from now I'll be walking all over Indianapolis and Chicago for the annual FFA National Convention... This is kind of inconvenient timing. Just a little.

:(

OM NOM NOM!

2008-10-13T00:30:00.002-04:00

As a society, we devalued farming as an occupation and encouraged the best students to leave the farm for “better” jobs in the city. We emptied America’s rural counties in order to supply workers to urban factories. To put it bluntly, we now need to reverse course. We need more highly skilled small farmers in more places all across America — not as a matter of nostalgia for the agrarian past but as a matter of national security. For nations that lose the ability to substantially feed themselves will find themselves as gravely compromised in their international dealings as nations that depend on foreign sources of oil presently do. But while there are alternatives to oil, there are no alternatives to food.
-Michael Pollan

Okay, I will admit that I should be working on my 18.01 p-sets right now. But I was checking my e-mail and checking the New York Times website and found this amazing article.

I think it's a really long article, but it makes a lot of good points and has a ridiculous amount of information throughout. Pollan makes a really good point about campaign issues and food production - agriculture really is important and really is being ignored by both sides in the campaign for the White House. While Pollan suggests that a lot of new programs be created to modify the United States food production that I think would probably be somewhat ineffective, I feel he has the right idea. He brings up agroterrorism, which is awesome because it's rarely talked about, and I think it's good that someone in the public eye is calling for a reform of the system that would make our food supply more secure. I really like what he says about ag education and those are some of the reasons I'm planning on going into agriculture for a career (even though I'm a student at one of the only land-grant universities without an ag program...). And he is completely correct when he says that our society "devalued farming" and as a whole still believes that one is better off if they can leave the farm - I've run into this mentality so many places and I find it to be really strange. Minimizing the number of people involved in agriculture seems like a bad idea, and it is. That's less people producing food, which is eventually going to mean less food... And that's kind of a problem, right? It's also a problem that most farmers are over the age of 55. So encouraging more people to go into agriculture, especially those that have a good college education and understand the importance of utilizing good science and technology is definitely a good idea that has not received nearly as much attention as it should. This is not to say that it's being completely ignored - we do have the land-grant university system and FFA - but there are certainly schools that lack these programs or are cutting the ones they have because they aren't seen as a priority. FFA programs tend to be the exception, and never the rule except for some areas of rural America. Obviously there are some changes that need to be made.

A quick sidenote: If you're reading this and you happen to live in Oregon and be in FFA, you need to read this article... I definitely did not cover a lot of things he talks about, and there are a lot of really good facts and suggestions that deal with a number of Parli Pro and extemp topics... Hey, you could even use some of this for, oh I don't know, an Ag Issues topic or something... Anyway, there are a lot of good numbers that would sound quite nice thrown out in a debate or speech. Have fun!

I would be super happy...

2008-10-11T00:37:00.002-04:00

... if my foot stopped hurting right now.

I don't know what I did - there's not been one singular incident that would cause my foot to hurt this much so I am pretty confused. It's been somewhat manageable all day, I just wore flip flops for a while because it was a little swollen, but right now I can't even put weight on it. I have ice on it right now, which is awesome because it feels amazing, but I obviously can't do that for extended periods of time or be mobile with a massive bag o' ice taped to my foot. I think I've just screwed up the muscles somehow, but how I managed that one is a really good question.

Sorry, I really needed to complain about it, because it's crazy-painful. And now I'm going to go to bed because I have to be up early for a debate tournament at Hahvahd.

Who's Excited?

2008-10-05T18:28:00.004-04:00

Oh man.

New Franz Ferdinand.

How beautiful is that? I'm really excited for them to come play in the US again, because I will definitely see them live again because they are AMAZING. Though that might be a while, because, according to Wikipedia, their third album won't be released until January of '09. It's still exciting though!

And let's not forget about new Cold War Kids! Too bad their show in Boston is sold out, which is sad, because the venue is only about three blocks away from MIT's campus.

Why I Officially Win (Or, some of the positive things in my life right now)

2008-10-02T14:47:00.004-04:00

For my Film Experience class, I'm supposed to write several papers about the movies we watch in class to fulfill the HASS-D requirement. My first paper was on the role of accident in Buster Keaton's The General.

This is a story of what NOT to do (and what I'll never ever do again, I promise).

I have a lot on my plate lately, between all my classes and debate and WMBR. The extracurriculars don't take up that much time away from p-sets, but the work consumes every other waking moment (when I'm not obsessively checking my e-mail or Google Reader, of course) of my life. P-sets that require math (which is pretty much all of them) get my attention first, because I know they will take me the longest. Then I work on chemistry, because the math for that mostly just requires a calculator - yea for no derivatives!

HASS-D? What HASS-D? Oh, yeah, HASS-D... That one class that eats up every Tuesday evening with two lectures and a full-length film (sometimes two of them!)... Now, I really like the subject. And I really like the fact that it allows me to write (Too. Many. Numbers.). But I forgot about the essay that was due today until the last minute. I started working on it last night (Mom, Dad, I know you're already freaking out... Just hold your horses and remember how I said I would never ever do this again...) and didn't get much done. Then I woke up late this morning, without much time to work on my paper.

Panic set in, and after the quickest shower of my life (no joke) I was pounding away on my keyboard. I only paused to get juice from our fridge on the opposite side of the room, then I was back to describing what some critics call Keaton's greatest film.

Page totals:
Last night - 1.25 pages
This morning after an hour and a half of work - 5 pages

Oh snap. I powered through nearly four pages of an essay in an hour and a half. At that rate, I would have had my Senior Project paper (all 12 pages of it) done in a day. Truth be told, I had no idea I was capable of that. Another great thing - this isn't my worst writing ever. As in, I'm not ashamed to turn it in like it is.

But I will never ever do that again because now my brain is fried and I need some food.

In other news... I got eight hours of sleep last night! Go me! That's a record, I think, for the past two weeks. Which is terrible. But, I've been doing a bit of it without caffeine, so that's good (This is not to say, however, that I've not had coffee. I completely forgot how relaxing it is to just get a cup of coffee and sit in a comfortable chair for a while, not doing any hardcore work until I did it at Starbucks the other day... I need to do that a little bit more often).

Turns out I got a 65 on my 18.01 (single-variable calculus) test last week... WHICH IS AWESOME. In the real world, this might not be a very good score, but for MIT (and me) that is not bad and I am really really happy about it. And we are now going to completely ignore the train wreck that was my 8.01L (physics) score.

There's a ton of cool stuff going on tonight, however. Dale Chihuly is speaking at MIT tonight at 6:30, and I am unbelievably excited for that. He's an amazing glass-blower and I've seen his work exhibited all over the US, so it'll be really interesting to actually see him speak and give a presentation. Also tonight is the Vice-Presidential debate! I'm not too impressed with either Biden or Palin, so this will be interesting. The Tech had a wonderful take on the upcoming debate (I don't recommend playing this game - alcohol poisoning is bad - but it's at least funny to read).

Also, TWO WEEKS UNTIL NATIONAL CONVENTION. That's right, the annual FFA National Convention in Indianapolis is coming up, and I am missing a whole week of classes to go and compete/kick some serious butt in Ag Communications (a journalism contest). It's going to be amazing!

Random tidbit of information: Buster Keaton's The General was filmed entirely in Oregon. That's right, they've been filming movies in Oregon since at least 1927. In my book, that's awesome (and far more awesome than The Hunted being filmed in Oregon City).

Humidity, we are not friends.

2008-09-28T14:53:00.007-04:00

Just thought I'd put that out there.

So, the weather here is ridiculously humid and rainy. I am not a fan at all.

Cool things going on in the life of Kelsey:

Debate
This past weekend was the Columbia University tournament in New York City, so I got to see New York for the first time! We ended up getting there a little early on Friday, so we took the subway to Times Square to grab some lunch. The tournament magically got over pretty early so we actually got some sleep (it was beautiful) and that made the next day a lot easier. Aditi and I went 2-3 for the tournament... After everyone finished their five rounds, some went back to MIT, while some of us stayed behind in New York with the other car. We walked from Columbia to Columbus Circle while taking detours through Central Park.
Along the way we saw a number of landmarks, including... drum roll please... the Guggenheim!
Here it is in all its Frank Lloyd Wright glory:
And here's a picture to help you understand the weather in the city while we were there:
It was unbelievably muggy, and I have some terrible blisters from my flip flops. :(

Overall, I'm ridiculously happy I'm doing debate. I'm still working on transitioning to this new format, and I don't know that I'm really thinking like a debater yet, but I'm noticing major improvements so I think it'll be okay.

Radio!
So, I officially have a show now! It's on Tuesday mornings/Monday nights at 1-2 AM EDT/10-11 PM PDT. It's over the air at 88.1 fm, and for those of you outside the Cambridge area you can stream it at wmbr.org. Pretty much, I am really excited.

School work
I had two exams last week, and I have another one this Wednesday. P-sets are still insane. I still hate Mastering Physics. I have a five-page essay about The General due on Thursday (YEA! Writing makes me happy...). You know, the usual.

Interesting Articles
Okay, so these aren't really things going on in my life per se, but they came up in my RSS feeder. The first one is really interesting and the forestry nerd in me is a big fan. The second one is for my dear friends Joanna and Elisa. Enjoy!

Preventing forest fires with tree power

Wild turkeys wear out welcome in Philomath (This could Tom Dinner's future! Or maybe we should let Vespa take care of the problem... She could tackle them.)

[Edit: here's another interesting article I just found...
NASA Mars Lander Sees Falling Snow, Soil Data Suggest Liquid Past
That is hardcore.]

Muzak
And now for some happy music. I discovered this video today (well, the video, not the song) and thought I'd share...

Irving - "Situation"

Learning a few tough lessons...

2008-09-22T00:09:00.005-04:00

Holy crap.

MIT is eating me alive.

No joke.

For the past three weeks, I have been wondering daily what I did to get into this school. I've been told it's normal, and I'm trying so hard to believe that. The work is flat out insane. It takes me a ridiculous amount of time to do p-sets, and I haven't been able to turn a completed one in yet - they've all been missing answers to a few problems because I have no clue what I'm doing! I'm working on finding out when office hours that I can actually go to are (my schedule prevents me from going to quite a few of them), and I'm not procrastinating too much (I haven't even blogged!). It's just more work than I've ever seen in my life, and it happens weekly!

So, enough complaints about the work. I guess I should blog about the things I promised you I would blog about!

School Work!
Okay, just kidding. More complaints about work. Basically, I'm drowning in work, I don't understand a word of lecture, and I HATE MASTERING PHYSICS. For those of you not familiar, Mastering Physics is an internet-based program that has a ton of physics questions, and it's really annoying, and my class has it due at 10:00 on Sunday nights, which is actually really inconvenient. Especially considering the problems don't get posted until Friday. Thanks for screwing up my weekends, Mastering Physics. Really. I appreciate it like there's no tomorrow. Plus, I haven't really done hardcore algebra in about a year, and everything I'm taking (excluding The Film Experience [21L.011]) requires it. It's terrible.

Article in The Tech!
Oh yes... Officially published!
MIT Climbs Back to 4th in US News & World Report Ranking

Wombats Concert
Way back on September 10th, my roommate, Tess, and I went to T.T. The Bear's Place to see the Wombats live. We got there kind of early, which worked out really well because we ended up standing right up against the stage. The venue itself was really amazing - intimate, clean, and just right for a good show. The show itself was pretty good overall. The first band, the Spring Tigers, weren't that good, and their sound guy was terrible. The Postelles played next and weren't too bad, but the really annoying girl that was next to me that was way too into the music and dancing really badly kind of ruined that set. The Wombats' set was amazing, and I definitely had bruises afterward. We were right up against the stage, and the jackasses behind us kept pushing forward and the stage was right at knee-height. Yeah. Painful.

DEBATE!
Oh my goodness, I am loving debate! APDA is pretty much amazing. It's incredibly different from Parli Pro, but I really like it nonetheless. The people are all really fun, and the format is challenging.

Okay, so I am way too tired to write more. I think I'm coming down with a cold (everyone on my floor is sick, pretty much), but don't worry Mom and Dad - I'm staying hydrated and I'm going to sleep a lot tomorrow because it's a THREE DAY WEEKEND (My sincerest thanks to the 'tvte for this fabulous weekend. Seriously.).

Alright kids, I'm out.

I'm still alive, I promise.

2008-09-11T18:18:00.003-04:00

Okay, so I realize that I haven't updated in nearly a week.

But this isn't going to be all that exciting of a post. Basically, I'm still alive (though my marathon p-setting session that I'm about to start may change that) and not insane just yet. I won't be able to post an actual blog that's all that interesting until maybe Sunday, but here's what you can expect in the future:

An overly-detailed description of how much I hate p-sets. And Mastering Physics. And how I forgot how to do basic algebra and how severely that's screwing me over.
An article I wrote was published in The Tech!
Tales from the Wombats concert I went to last night with Tess at T.T. the Bear's Place in Cambridge. Let's just say that I'm a little bruised.
All about my trip to Johns Hopkins with the Parliamentary Debate team! (YEA!)

I'm sure there's more I could talk about, but I'm kind of brain-dead right now, so I can't really remember what else has gone on lately...

What I will say now, however, is that I'm really happy I was able to get into the Film Experience HASS-D class. It's beyond amazing. Seriously. In recitation today, we just critiqued Buster Keaton and D.W. Griffith silent movies like they were the latest modern blockbusters. As a complete and total film geek, it made me happy.

Okay kids, I'm off to finish three p-sets in one sitting. Hopefully, I'll come out of this okay - otherwise I'm just going to be a blob of jello.

Frustration at its Finest

2008-09-05T23:40:00.000-04:00

I'm about to throw a brand spankin' new printer at the wall.

Tess and I decided to get this beautiful piece of equipment not only because it's pretty but it's also wireless. Wireless is really nice.

What's not really nice is a crappy printer that can't feed a piece of paper through it for the test print page. Seriously. This thing is eating paper like mad and I can't get past step nine of set-up because of it.
All that paper on the floor? Even the stuff that's printed on? Destroyed by the printer. I put in some blank paper but it was destroyed pretty quickly, so I decided to use scrap paper from the American Foreign Policy class that I didn't end up getting into (which I'm not happy about...). All destroyed.

It'd be really nice if it would just work! You have no idea how angry it's made me. I guess I shouldn't let a printer upset me that much, but I'm really frustrated because I can't figure out the problem and I'm sure it'll be something simple.

In other news... I can't take the French class I wanted to take, and I couldn't get into American Foreign Policy, so now I'm taking The Film Experience as my HASS-D CI-H class! I'm really excited because now I get to watch a ton of movies. More importantly, I think it will be interesting and I'll enjoy it, so it'll be a nice balance for all the science and math (which, I suppose, was the intention behind the HASS-D requirement...). PE lottery results also came out today, and I got into my first choice class - Fencing (Foil)! Oh yeah! Except the class is on my two busiest days, but I really want to take the class so I really shouldn't complain.

Now I'm going to bed, so I can work on p-sets all weekend (yea for three of them!)...

An Easy Way to Make Me Happy

2008-09-04T19:42:00.002-04:00

This was on the 5.111 (chemistry) website today:

-

A note on the textbook

The official textbook for 5.111 is the 4th edition of Atkins and Jones, and all reading assignments and extra review problems (given prior to exams) match up with the page and problem numbering of this edition. However, we realize that the 3rd edition is significantly less expensive and that many of you have a copy of this edition, so we will make every effort to include the corresponding reading and practice problems from the 3rd edition. However, please keep in mind that there will be some cases where there is a section of reading that is slightly different in the different editions. Since the problem set questions are typed out, the 4th edition of the book is NOT needed for problem sets.

We continued using the 3rd edition for as long as possible in this course, but we had to swich this year because the publisher stopped printing new copies of the 3rd edition over a year ago, and we couldn't guarantee there would be enough copies for the ~400 students in 5.111 and 5.112.

-

Simply put, that is beautiful. I bought the 3rd edition from an upperclassman, because the 4th edition is beyond expensive - I was beginning to think I'd have to start selling off limbs on the black market to cover the cost of textbooks.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I have some reading to do, out of my 3rd edition textbook.

I am way too tired to come up with a decent title for this.

2008-09-03T00:38:00.004-04:00

So, the past few days have been rather epic, no lie.

Sunday, Tess and I went with a bunch of random people to the Museum of Fine Arts (free with our snazzy MIT ID cards...) and saw some fabulous fine arts! Actually, it was really amazing and I nearly died when I went into the Impressionism room because Monet and Degas just make me so happy. After the art museum and a fruitless search at the Galleria mall for hangers for Tess, I was off to a million and two (okay, three) club intro meetings.

First was the Parliamentary Debate team, which I am ridiculously excited about. I really miss competitions, and debate is going to be amazing. As soon as the demo round was over, I dashed over to the student center to go to the Tech. I volunteered myself for writing a story about the US News and World Report rankings, which I am kicking myself over because it's already stressing me out. Not good. Anyway. So, after visiting the snazzy offices of the campus newspaper, I hiked on over to WMBR, MIT's radio station. We got to eat free pizza (which, by the way, was better than the pizza they gave us at the Tech), and we got a tour of the station, which is pretty bad-ass.

On Monday, Tess, Stunes and I went to Target. My oh my, was that epic. So, we had to trek to the bus stop in Central Square, take a bus, walk several blocks and across the Target parking lot. After we came out of the store with an entire cart's contents in giant bags, we went back to the bus stop and waited, and waited, and waited. The bus we wanted never came, so we ended up having to take a bus to Harvard Square, where we got on the T and took that to Central Square and then we had to walk back to Simmons from there (and that is a long walk when you're carrying a bajillion things). It was a really long day, and I naturally complained a lot.

Tuesday morning, I was on the radio! Yeppers...
Stream it here. I played the set starting with "Oregon Girl" by Someone Still Loves You, Boris Yeltsin. Pretty much, the second half-hour. The other shows are good too, though! Definitely listen to them! And you can make fun of the times where I messed up. Whoo...

Today, I worked on getting textbooks. Holy crap, they are expensive. If I went through the Coop for everything, I'd have to pay something like $860. Which is not going to happen. I really hate whoever decided that these books needed to be so damn expensive. Seriously, our high school textbooks were at most $60 and they really aren't all that different. Grrrr...

And now I'm going to bed because I am really tired and I have classes in the morning! Yea! Sorry if this post is rife with errors or passages of incoherence. My brain is already pretty much a goner. For now, here's this interesting (okay, maybe if you're from the Northwest) article about spotted owls! I like how they don't mention that the spotted owls and barred owls are cross-breeding in the wild...

Oh, and hi there Mom and Dad! :)

Classes? OH NOES!

2008-08-29T15:19:00.002-04:00

Yep, that's right! I finally registered for classes!

So, officially, I'm registered for 5.111 (Chemistry), 18.01 (Single-variable calculus), 21F.376 (French I with Globalization), and 8.01L (Physics - Classical Mechanics [Long - which means it goes into January]). Unfortunately, it all doesn't really fit into my schedule.

Also, looking at the 8.01L stuff online, I realized that we covered all that material in high school. In fact, I magically still remember some of it. So, while 8.01 and 8.01L cover the exact same material, I think I might actually be able to handle the faster-paced class. Plus, it's Pass/No Record.

I'm also wondering about 18.01. I took calculus in high school, and while I am a little fuzzy on how to do it anymore, I think that once I get into a class and actually see it again, it'll all come flooding back to me. At least, that's what I'm afraid will happen, and then I'll be bored. I'm not really sure about the protocol when it comes to switching into 18.02 (Multivariable calculus) without having taken the Advanced Standing Exam or have transfer credit (though I suppose I could get it if I really tried, but it might be difficult from here). And again, it's Pass/No Record this first semester...

I do need to finagle my way into Globalization, however. That's the class that is in conjunction with the French class, and is the HASS-D (Humanities, Arts, and Social Sciences - Distribution) that sounds the most interesting to me... Other than, perhaps, the Film Experience one (I figure learning a new language might be a better thing for me than watching movies for class, which could be a very dangerous thing for me...). My advisor says there are quite a few spots left, which is fantastic.

Basically, I need to switch around a million recitation times, add and drop classes and all that jazz just to have a schedule that works right now. And I don't even know what P.E. class I'm in yet (but I did just enter the lottery for it! YEA!). I hate working out scheduling logistics.

While figuring out classes, I also need to figure out what activities I'm going to be doing when I'm not drowning in p-sets (Problem Sets...). I went to the Activities Midway yesterday afternoon, and I was definitely overwhelmed by the massive amount of things I could get involved with. Debate, music, photography, etc. There are a million and two things I want to do, and definitely not enough time for everything. Hopefully it will all work out.

Now I'm going to go try to have a good weekend before classes make me want to die. :)

Screw You Guys, I'm Going Home.

2008-08-26T19:43:00.003-04:00

Ah, Cartman. I actually miss "South Park" right now. Sadness.

So. Today was my first crappy day here! Fun, right? Okay, not so much.

Last night probably set me up for the bad day, though those events have zero impact on the things that have pissed me off. I went on a certain citrus-y tour of campus last night, open only to students. I had a blast, and it was quite the adventure. I got back into the dorm at 4 AM, so I was exhausted. I've been running on very little sleep this last week and a half, so I slept all day. No, really. I didn't get out of bed until noon, and even then I just cleared off my desk and watched some "Arrested Development" on Hulu. After that, I decided that I had expended far too much energy, and just went back to bed until 3.

While checking Facebook later on, I learned that the Math Diagnostic results were out. Now, the Math Diagnostic was a 20-question test I took yesterday morning that determines which physics class I'll be in. There was some calculus and some pre-calc on there, and some stuff that I had no idea existed. Here's what I read today:
Math Diagnostic for Physics Placement Results

SCORE:
21
Comments and Advice:

As judged by your performance on this Diagnostic, your score indicates weakness in your high school math skills. For this reason, the Physics Department strongly recommends that you enroll in 8.01L, the longer version of Physics I designed for students with weak background in math or physics. You should also be concurrently enrolled in a version of 18.01, Calculus I. Please discuss these decisions with your freshman advisor. You are also strongly encouraged to work through the problems in the Math Review Modules available at: http://mit.edu/firstyear/mathdiagnostic/modules.html.

:(

Then, I was in the Athena Cluster in the Student Center (basically, a computer lab), checking Facebook (goodness, I'm not an addict... *cough*) when I saw stuff about the Admissions Blogger results. When I finally made it through the post and saw the list, I was mildly (okay, really really) disappointed. My name was definitely not on there. Gah. I'm kind of miffed right now, but I think it's going to be like State Office, where I'll be glad I didn't get it about a week from now. It's still a little annoying though.

I guess things could be a lot worse, but these things really just add to the list of reasons why I statistically (or otherwise) should not have been admitted to MIT. I really just don't get how I'm going to survive here.

XKCD's random button makes me happy, though.

This is actually a lot like getting to my house in Oregon. No lie.

Exhaustion at its Finest

2008-08-26T04:29:00.002-04:00

Oh my goodness, I need so much sleep right now.

Let's just say that I had an epic evening. While it was fun, I AM SLOWLY LOSING IT. Really. I haven't adjusted to the whole minimal-sleep schedule that I normally keep during the school year that will be perfect here at MIT. And now I am slowly going crazy, or at least that's what it feels like.

:(

There's Going To Be A Throw-Down...

2008-08-25T01:23:00.003-04:00

I was flipping through the You Ain't No Picasso archives, catching up on everything I'd missed over the summer, when I found this.

Seriously, MTV, I will fight you. I may be a stick-thin girl that breaks easily, but I will take you down if you mess with Rocky Horror Picture Show.

Watch your back.

Robots Robots Robots

2008-08-22T23:05:00.000-04:00

Wow. For a while there, I lost track of what day it was. This past week has been flying by. DME has us on the go for what seems like every second of the day. We're always in the lab soldering away on our robots, or we're eating, or we're off somewhere in Boston exploring and learning a bajillion (a highly scientific quantity) new things. I don't know if I can really remember enough to blog it all sequentially. But, I'll try.

Tuesday night, after working in the Pappalardo lab all day on our robots, we had a delicious dinner, and then a group of us went out for ice cream at J.P. Licks. Oh my goodness, it was delicious. Afterward, we (okay, we being Omar and I) really wanted to go see the Apple store up on Boylston. Because, well, it's just amazing. For your viewing pleasure, here's a picture of the staircase. (It was at night, and I couldn't really get a good picture outside. But know that it's three stories, all glass, and just plain beautiful. And they better be able to fix my computer.)

After popping into the Apple store, we trekked back over to Newbury street and visited the famous Newbury Comics.

Now, back in Portland, there's Music Millennium. This place has wonderful CDs, and a random assortment of fun stuff. Newbury comics, however, has vinyl galore, beautifully priced CDs (It was cheaper for me to buy Gang of Four's Entertainment! here, even with tax, than it was to buy it at Music Millenium. And I'm still supporting a local record store.), fabulous movies (They even had Brazil within eight feet of the store entrance on an end-cap display!), and a million other things that I am completely in love with right now.

The next day we spent more time in the lab, and in the afternoon, we headed out to Georges Island. Basically, there's a fort on this small island out in the harbor and they've got a little park area inside it. I'll just post some pictures for you of the park area and our explorations!

After finally making it back from the island (the ferry took forever to come out to the island), we were off to mentor dinners. Pretty much, the mentors were all going to different places for dinner, and we could go with any one of them. I decided to go with the group that headed to Harvard Square for some Mexican and Cajun food at the Border Cafe. It was an interesting combo, but the meal I had was delicious! Definitely going back...

Okay, I will pick up again with Thursday's activities tomorrow, because I am really tired right now and this is what I get for not blogging for several days during the craziest time of my life... Things get a little behind. Sorry about that...
More later!

Blogging... Um, yeah.

2008-08-20T02:03:00.001-04:00

So, Omar, I tried. And here it is. Epic fail.

Oh, and everyone: Newbury comics is my new favorite place. No lie.

Film Commentary

2008-08-18T22:06:00.000-04:00

[Spoilers may be in this entry. Do not read if you don't want "Wall-E" ruined for you!]

So, I have this really bad habit of making really snide comments during movies. Well, not as bad as my friend Ashlee, but still pretty bad. So I'm really quite proud of myself right now, because I avoided making an entire room of people angry! I kept my mouth shut the entire time, and instead of sarcastically commenting on the special effects, or how something goes against the laws of physics, I wrote everything down. Good idea, eh?

As part of the DME FPOP (Oh yeah, throwin' some MIT acronyms at ya there... DME = Discover Mechanical Engineering, and FPOP = Freshman Pre-Orientation Program), we watched Wall-E after dinner.

Now, I had never seen Wall-E before tonight. I can distinctly remember sitting in a theater and seeing the trailer but refusing to see the movie because they used the theme song from this movie. This is also why I will never use a Visa Check Card at a garden center, or see Michael Moore's Sicko.

Using the theme song from Brazil says a few things to me. First, it reminds me of the final scene of that movie (Those of you that have seen it know what I'm talking about... Well, you do if you haven't seen the Love Conquers All version) and kind of makes me freak out because that final scene will haunt you for life. Second, it makes me think of the message of Brazil, and that whoever is using it is trying to make a point, but can't find a better, more creative way to do it (Think about the check card commercial and the movie. Really, if you've seen the movie, compare them. Commentary on society in a 29 second commercial? Oh yes. Ripping off Brazil? Oh yes.).

But I was a good sport and watched the movie tonight. And wrote down my thoughts.

First off, the little Wall-E guy is fooled by lasers. Something tells me this little guy would be amusing at a laser light show. Or a planetarium. Basically, let's take him to OMSI and just sit and watch.
Louis Armstrong. Really? Hm. I don't know if I'm okay with that.
Okay, if I were a young child, I would be terrified of this movie. Then again, I hated/was scared of E.T., so I'm probably not a good indicator considering how popular that movie was/is.
The post-apocalypse jokes are a tad bit old. Just like the cockroach and the Twinkie in that movie.
How are there crickets in space? Did they just decide that they needed something sound-wise there? Or did I miss something?
"Stay the course." Good one, Pixar. Because no one's been making fun of that one for a while. I get enough of that on the Daily Show, thanks. Oh, and Jon Stewart's much better on the delivery of that one.
Fire extinguishers in space. Really, that's all I have to say on that one. I'm kind of at a loss for words.

So it was pretty much a huge satirization of American materialism, and apparently plants and coolers are important. I understand a little better why they used the song in the trailer (but not the movie) but some poor kid is going to be horribly confused later on down the road when they have happy thoughts associated with that music. Horribly, terribly, horrifically confused.

(On a good note, I did like the beginning of DME. The people are nice, and it looks like it's going to be amazing amounts of fun. I just make snarky comments about movies all the time, so this was going to happen regardless.)

Swimming, Swimming, In a Swimming Hell... I Mean Pool

2008-08-18T16:10:00.000-04:00

I nearly died taking the swim test.

No, really.

I made it 3/4 of the way through the swim test, when I couldn't go any further. My legs were tired, and I simply could not breathe. What condition does Kelsey have that would incapacitate her in a pool? Why, exercise-induced asthma, of course! Go me! Okay, not so much.

Fortunately, the people at the pool are really really really nice and let me retake it after taking a few puffs on my inhaler and resting for a few moments... I barely passed the second time, and now I don't have to take a swim class! Yea! Afterward, I was a little (okay, a lot) shaky, and I think I'm a little dehydrated now...

Time to go get some Vitamin Water.

Good morning from Cambridge!

2008-08-18T09:18:00.001-04:00

Holy crap, I just woke up at MIT...

This is a really strange feeling, not going to lie. It's just really strange to think that I am actually here. I'm a student at MIT. Weird. I still don't know if I could say that in everyday conversation. This is just some place you always hear about - you never actually go to it.

Except I'm here right now. Without a lot of my stuff. I'm waiting for all of it to be shipped, so I have to go about two weeks without a lot of things. And I mean a lot. When you try to pack a majority of your life into boxes and suitcases, you realize that you own a lot of crap. I now know that I have way too many shoes, way too many clothes, and not enough organizational capabilities. My big suitcase was exactly 50 pounds, and my smaller one is completely full of shoes. And I mean completely full. I'm one of those over-planners where I sit there and go, "Well, if this happens, I'm going to need this. But if that happens, I'm going to need that... Hmmm... Might as well pack 'em both!" This creates some problems because I take a lot of stuff everywhere (Take a look in my purse or backpack. You'll see what I mean.) and lugging around all that stuff isn't helping me build any sweet guns (carrying water buckets at camp, however...). And sweet guns would be nice.

My dorm room is... interesting. It's got a ton of modular furniture in it, and it seems really empty right now. I don't know that I'll actually get to keep this room after the readjustment lottery, but I wouldn't mind it. It's kind of long and narrow, but there's some amazing views of the playing fields and the Boston skyline. Speaking of which, it's really bright here at night. I mean, I know it's a city, but it's going to take some getting-used-to. Anyway. So, my dorm seems really empty because my roommate, Tess, doesn't get here until the 22nd, and I just have a couple suitcases and my sleeping bag (because there's no point in sheets and all that jazz if I have to move again) and my computer. And the linoleum floor isn't exactly cozy. But I do like Simmons quite a lot, and being on the 10th floor is nowhere near as bad as I thought it would be. I just complain a lot.

I kind of miss everyone back home. Wait, that came out wrong. Well, I do miss you guys, and it's already strange to not be around a ton of people that I've known since Kindergarten and whatnot, but I'm not at all homesick. Which is a good thing. Although, right now it just feels like it's camp or something - it doesn't feel like I'm here long-term. But I can tell that things are going to be amazing, so me being homesick is something we want to avoid, right? Right.

Oh, and it's really strange to be on Eastern Time. Seriously, it's like 5 AM back home, but I've been wide awake for a couple of hours now. There's no one to talk to online! It's just strange to have to calculate to figure out what time it is for everybody else. And I'm going to have to do this a lot. Well, I guess I'll get used to it...

So, I'm going to go get ready for my FPOP, and I'll leave you with a view from one of my many windows here in my Simmons dorm.

Hello MIT!

2008-08-17T20:36:00.000-04:00

So I really don't know how to structure this blog, not going to lie.

I'm at MIT right now, alive, and I really have to say that I am completely overwhelmed right now.

I'm running on zero sleep, having pulled an all-nighter packing (and still forgetting a multitude of things I really need... like shampoo) and being seated next to a screaming infant on the flight here. When I finally got to Logan, our flight was a half-hour late, and I had to wait for the MIT Shuttle for an hour. After dumping my extremely heavy suitcases in my temporary room in Simmons, I headed over to the student center and picked up my wonderful packet o' goodness. So now I have a snazzy MIT ID card, and a ton of other packets, CDs and booklets.

Actually being on campus is a little surreal. CPW was a good introduction, but I think it's finally hit me that I'm going to MIT, and I'm now here for several months. I'm going to be living here... And now, all of a sudden, campus is huge. Boston and Cambridge are huge. I'm definitely experiencing some culture shock again, which I think is a little annoying, but I suppose I'll just have to deal with it.

But in the meantime, I'm going to get some sleep, because I am exhausted beyond belief.

I ain't sayin' my goodbyes...

2008-08-15T14:36:00.001-04:00

Okay, sorry for the Tom Vek reference there. It was either that or an Elliot Smith reference, so I decided to go with the techno-y song.

I leave Sunday morning for MIT, and I have to say that I'm actually genuinely wanting to go now. A few days ago, I really just wanted more time at home and hated saying goodbye to everyone and everything here in Oregon. Now I really just want to get it over with and get to MIT already!

Wednesday night was my going away (but not forever) party! My mom made quite a spread, and we're still trying to eat all the extra food she made (and there's A LOT). Everyone was amazing for coming, and we all had a really good time. Sorry I didn't take any pictures - I'm a huge bum, I know - but I wasn't really thinking about my camera. The games of elbow-tag and Mafia were amazing (and yes, we did play classic summer camp games at my party... there were a million people there who are camp counselors during the summer) and staying at Shari's until 3 AM was pretty fabulous. Our waitress is pretty much my new favorite person. She asked if it was my birthday (we definitely showed up with a group of 10 at 12:30 AM), and when she was told that it was my going away party, she said she'd give me pie anyway. So, I got a slice of cookies and cream pie because I'm going off to MIT. And it was delicious.

Okay, so I'm going to go work on getting new glasses and a few last minute things for school. And then I'm heading home to pack! I don't have a single box filled, and my suitcases are empty. I've been putting it off because it's just so eerie to me to be leaving home, but I think I'm finally ready...

ONE WEEK!

2008-08-10T10:05:00.000-04:00

So, this is definitely a scheduled post, but it's definitely at the exact time my flight to MIT is scheduled to leave a week from now!

On one hand, I am excited beyond measure. DME is going to be amazing, and so will everything else. But, I'm also sort of freaking out because OH MY GOODNESS I'M LEAVING FOR COLLEGE AND I'LL BE 2,700 MILES AWAY FROM HOME.

I really need to try and be a lot more zen about this.

Time for more packing. Figuring out suitcase logistics might just save my sanity.

A small piece of advice...

2008-08-07T02:51:00.000-04:00

When you're invited to come help build a rock wall...

WEAR GLOVES.

I was a super genius and used my bare hands this afternoon. And now my fingers hurt like none other. Typing is even a painful activity. But, on the plus side, the wall was looking amazing when I left...

Something else that's awesome? I get to be on our FFA chapter's county fair Livestock Judging team this weekend! It looks like it's going to be my last time participating in the contest, which is kind of sad, but I'm looking forward to it. I've never competed at the county level before, so this'll be interesting, but it's going to be fun. And then I can spend time at our small county fair afterward! Yea! Let's just hope it's a cool day, because hot weather, navy blue corduroy coats, and black pants aren't a fun combination. Trust me.

Score!

2008-08-05T20:37:00.000-04:00

So, I love Goodwill.

The Goodwill in McMinnville (the nearest town with multiple stoplights...) doesn't really have a good selection of clothing, or any other item, really. Except music. Now, I'm sure I could find a better selection at a Goodwill in Portland, but for some odd reason, our little Goodwill has some amazing things pop up in the music section.

I'm going to blame this on the proximity of Linfield College, and in turn, a large number of young students, but I guess I really don't care why it happens, it just does. I've come across so many promotional copies of CDs, and really random vinyl albums. 12" Yaz single, still in the original plastic wrap and the 1987 price sticker? Overwhelming amounts of Billy Joel (I only bought one, I promise...)? A Rutles 45? Yessums! It's really a beautiful thing... I definitely paid only $2.50 for six 45s this afternoon, which is great because I can now go home and put them on my computer...

Leaving? What?

2008-08-04T19:59:00.000-04:00

I still don't know if this whole MIT-thing has sunk in yet.

I leave in 13 days (not that I'm counting or anything) but I can't really wrap my mind around the fact that I'm going to the other side of the country for several months, and when I come home, it's only going to be for short amounts of time.

But, in 13 days, I'll be at MIT and it's going to be amazing.

You have no idea how pissed I am right now.

2008-07-30T20:58:00.000-04:00

Why is it that any time I blog about anything relating to the Apple Store, I am super-angry and its always about how my computer is broken. I will say that the first time I was impressed by the customer service, but this is just getting ridiculous.

My computer is broken again. So, the internet wasn't working for a while, but as soon as the guy at the genius bar opened Safari, it was working. What the hell?! But they told me that they were going to replace my topcase because it's broken AGAIN, but it was going to take 1-3 days. It definitely took an hour last time, and I live 1.5 hours away from this store, so I flat out said that wasn't going to work. And so it's taking four hours now. And my friend Ashlee and I have exhausted every possible source of entertainment in this mall. We ate out of boredom, I found new glasses, we went bra shopping, we went clothes shopping, and my friend is missing her dad's birthday because of my damn computer.

And their iPod touches won't let me blog on them, so that's my explanation for the last post.

Rawr.

hello from an iPod touch

2008-07-30T18:13:00.000-04:00

3 weeks?! Wait. How did that happen?!?!

2008-07-28T01:48:00.000-04:00

Yep. I have three weeks left until I head off to MIT.

It's kind of freaking me out, not gonna lie. At the beginning of the summer I couldn't wait and it felt like I had forever before I had to leave. And now I'm looking at a packed three weeks, full of packing, eating at all my favorite restaurants one last time, packing, late-night Shari's runs with friends (because french toast and scrambled eggs taste AMAZING at 2 AM), hiking, trips to Powell's, and more packing!

I'm really happy that I was able to go back to camp for a couple of weeks, though. Everyone was amazing, and the last week I was a Unit Leader and had perfect campers. Perfect! It was kind of unbelievable. And I was able to hike up to the Falls on the last day (Eleven summers there, and I'd never seen them. Pathetic.) and I got to spend time with three of my best friends and overall I am super-happy that I went because I feel just a little bit more sane and ready for life.

Things are really started to become a lot more real. Housing results came out while I was at camp, and I finally checked them on Friday. I'm in Simmons! On the 10th floor... Sad sauce. [Oh goodness. Definitely picked that one up from Meghann...] But, the Blogger application also came out! Which is very exciting, except I really don't know how that's going to go. Lolcats or YouTube art: two things I really don't know much about. And, my laptop is still being a brat and refuses to connect to the internet. Yea! Go me!

My friend Damian had a going-away party yesterday (he left for Basic for the Marines today) and it was really strange. All my friends are moving out of their parents' houses and going off to school or getting jobs and I don't know if I'm fully comprehending the fact that I'm not going to see some of these people again, and we're all going separate ways. There are people I've gone to school with for 13 years, and now I'm not going to see them on a daily basis for nine months every year. In some respects, that's a good thing, but it's also really bad. It's just a weird transistion period and I really don't know how to react. Bleh.

Just kidding...

2008-07-18T20:56:00.000-04:00

Yeah. Didn't get stuff done on time, and that meant no posts for a week. Sorry about that!

Camp was amazing this past week. I didn't get any mail (thanks so much, everyone), but I did get a million mosquito bites and I had fun so I guess I didn't need your mail anyway.

Coming home is not great though. I missed the HASS-D lottery deadline because my laptop refuses to connect to a wireless network for some ridiculous reason and so now I can't take a HASS-D class in the fall, which means no Globalization. I am really frustrated by the fact that I can't find a problem with AirPort on my Mac. I tried two different wireless networks in downtown Corvallis, and nothing worked. It didn't matter whether I was using Firefox or Safari. It's really strange. And definitely not making me happy.

Oh, and my younger brother broke his leg this afternoon while riding his ATV. He definitely is at fault; he jumped it, stuck his feet out and one of them was too far down and when he landed his leg was in the way. Pure genius. But now that means I'm going to be subjected to way too much of Rob and Big and MTV Cribs and any other inane MTV programming. Good thing I'm going back to camp for another week.

For now, enjoy this article about Bill Nye the Science Guy...

Campity camp camp camp!

2008-07-11T18:46:00.000-04:00

Oh man, I am so excited. I get to work at camp again this summer.
Every summer I go to Girl Scout camp, and it's like a vacation where I get to be outside all the time and with all my friends, and I guess it's technically work because I'm responsible for the welfare of young girls. But all in all, it's amazing. After a serious argument with my parents (okay, mostly my dad), I am allowed to go this year. They're kind of freaking out over me leaving for MIT (in 37 DAYS!!!) so I guess I understand, but camp keeps me sane so I think 12 days out of my summer is not a bad trade-off for less stress when it comes time for me to completely pack up and leave.

Consequently, I won't be posting as much! Well, I wasn't doing a good job of that anyway, as evidenced by the nine-day silence. But Blogger is wonderful and allows one to schedule posts, so there will be reading material for all of you (yes, all of you, my dear and meager readership) while I'm off hiking and building fires and trying not to get mauled by some malicious forest creature. I would post my camp address because I really like getting mail, but I've learned from my friend's mistake. She posted the address on her Livejournal and got a creeper letter from some girl in Ohio. So everyone on staff wrote creeper letters back. Creeper mail is bad, children. But, if you're friends with me on Facebook, I'll be posting the address, so you better write to me. I'll even write back if I have a return address for you! It's really a great win-win situation.

In other news... I passed the FEE! Which is really fabulous. The comments on my essays kind of made me laugh. Some excerpts:
"These two essays represent some lively writing..."
"Both essays have an energetic quality that is refreshing."
"Your writing is lively and spirited..."
Apparently, the thesaurus entry for lively was popular? While those were positive, they pretty much said that I need outlines like there's no tomorrow. And I think they were probably saying, "WTF?!" at the end of my first essay because I used sentence fragments in my conclusion. Yes, I am stupid. Toward the end I definitely went into speech-mode with that essay. If it's read aloud, it sounds great! I think they hated my argumentative essay completely though. There's nothing positive in that one. They were probably wondering what the hell was wrong with me when I brought up CAFO inspections in my argumentative essay. If you know the topic, then you're probably having the same reaction. But I passed, and that's all that matters, right?

Happy late 4th of July, everyone. 'Cause I'm that hardcore... I hope it didn't rain when you were out watching fireworks like it did in Willamina. Because it was really uncomfortable.