| "Your smile could save our movie and the world" |
[Feb. 8th, 2006|02:44 pm] |
I bought my tickets; I'm officially going to New York.
I'll be staying with Emi at her house in Basking Ridge, NJ. We'll spend a lot of time in NYC, though, and possibly even drive to DC one day, which I think would be very exciting.
Part of spring break will also be spent in Norcal, though. I hope to get to spend some time with my families, as well as with Allie and my other friends. Maybe we'll even get some RP in! Who knows.
It's really hot today. 79 degrees. I don't like the heat. It'd be one thing if I were wearing shorts and lying out on the beach right now, but I'm here, cooped up at work. Bummer.
EDIT (3:18 PM): Just checked the weather again; it says we'll be hitting 83 degrees today. This is ridiculious. |
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| G-Ziss |
[Sep. 4th, 2005|12:45 am] |
I just got off the phone with Greg. He's been staying with Caitlin at the University of Georgia. Apparently he's just been sleeping on her couch for a few nights. Anyways, apparently his situation has changed again: He's not going to Davis this fall, he's going to be going to a private school in Wisconsin with his roomate. I guess they're giving really good financial aid to hurricane victims, and his roomate (from Tulalne) is also going there.
I was also really psyched to hear that Greg is getting really invovled with the hurricane relief effort. Coincidentally, this afternoon I decided I'm going to sell all my old magic cards on E-Bay, and give the proceeds to the red cross. This was inspired by the Penny Arcade charity auction, in which two pieces of art are currently going for over seven thousand dollars. I know my old cards aren't worth that much, but I'm pretty sure I can pick up at least a few hundred bucks for them, which ought to help the Red Cross at least a little. I also need to remember to donate blood. And I think I'm gonna give $50 or $100 as soon as I make sure I have enough in the bank and that I don't urgently need it. |
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[Aug. 31st, 2005|04:18 pm] |
As many of you likely know, I have somewhat of an obsession with the epic. Anything that is grand, majestic, monumental or simply huge will at the very least catch my attention and could very possibly spark a new obsession. Massive storm systems of course fit under this umbrella, so during last year's hurricane season I began to follow the weather situation in the Gulf closely.
Hurricane Katrina then, for obvious reasons, has been very interesting to follow. While the storm itself was fascinating to read about, what was even more interesting were the social impacts both before it struck and now during the emergency rescue phase. The sheer scale of the damage (80% of the city flooded; 70,000 in shelters, 40 field hospitals in place, etc) means that any sort of disaster management has to be both rapidly implemented and long-lasting.
Compounding the immediate problems of rescuing, feeding, and providing medical care for thousands of refugees is the fact that nearly all city facilities are unusable. The city (New Orleans) has no fresh water, no gas, and no electricity. All of it's major freeways have been destroyed, and both of it's airports are underwater.
Many of the problems are cyclical in nature; they are chicken-or-the-egg type situations. The city is underwater, so before electrical systems can be repaired the water must be pumped out. However, the pumps themselves require electrical power, which cannot be provided. Additionally, were the pumps working they would pump water out of the city and into the nearby lake, however due to the broken levees around the city, the lake is currently draining into New Orleans.
I read in an article today that the military is using Chinooks to airlift 3000 pound sandbags, and is dropping them on the levees in an attempt to seal the breaches. So many groups are working together and are invovled in the emergency operations: the National Guard, FEMA, the Red Cross, etc. I'm adding that to the list of things I might want to do: Being an emergency engineer who comes up with plans for how to do things like fix cities after hurricanes. |
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| Dashboard |
[Aug. 16th, 2005|10:30 am] |
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[Mar. 11th, 2005|04:22 pm] |
| [ | Tags | | | weather | ] |
| [ | Current Music |
| | Smashing Pumpkins - We Only Come Out at Night | ] |
84 Degress. I'm about to faint. If I can't deal with this weather then how could I ever live in San Diego? |
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[Nov. 21st, 2004|10:19 am] |
Well, due to “potential weather issues” over Las Vegas we get to sit around in OAK for two extra hours before our plane can depart. Lucikly for me, last night I decided to ressurect Fernando, to facilitate the writing of college essays during my short vacation. Of course, instead I have been using him to work on D&D material instead.
Fernando is now running Fedora Core 3, and although I haven't used it much at all so far it is a pretty good OS. The only problem I've encountered so far is a strange bug where OpenOffice causes my entire system to become unstable when I right-click a mispelt word for suggestions. I suspect it's trying to load some sort of massive dictionary into memory or something, but I'm not really sure. Since I don't have “the internets” right now I'll have to wait till I get home to check for bug reports and updates.
I don't really have much to write; I'm just lying here on the floor of the terminal. |
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| Rain |
[Sep. 22nd, 2004|11:00 pm] |
| [ | Tags | | | ramble, weather | ] |
| [ | Current Mood |
| | torn | ] |
| [ | Current Music |
| | Explosions in the Sky - Remember Me as a Time of Day | ] |
Last night as I was falling asleep I heard a noise outside, and it sounded like a storm. I know it couldn't possibly have been, but I don't know anything else that sounds like wind rustling leaves together as rain pounds down upon them.
Maybe I've been following the Atlantic hurricanes too closely, and thats why I find myself thinking about storms. Speaking of which, Hurricane Karl is heading straight for Iceland, and looks like it will strike in about five days. Otherwise it'll veer and hit Greenland or England. I suppose it could also dissipate before then; I really don't know much about these weather systems. Hurricane Jeanne looks like it's going to hit the Florida mainland in three days; I've already lost count of how many have blasted through there this month.
I want to learn more languages. Can I get my Spanish, French, and Japanese up to conversational levels by the end of the school year? No way. I don't even know why I'd set an absurd goal like that, but I'm an absurd guy, so there it is.
If you could take a machine back a year or two, or even more, would you do it? Would you go back and make that change, knowing that it could be the difference that perfects your life, but also knowing that it has the potential to ruin whatever you have now? Or would you take the machine forward, boldly leaving the world you know behind stepping out into the unknown.
I think the "right" answer is to stay here in the present, and live with the life you've already chosen. I'm not sure if I'd do that, though. I'm a risk taker; given the chance, I think I'd go back. Then again, things happen for a reason, and who am I to go against that? |
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| Frances |
[Sep. 5th, 2004|02:13 am] |
Today was pretty cool.
First we had Movie Day, where we watched Blade Runner, Barton Fink, Requiem for a Dream, and We're Back: A Dinosaur Story all in succession. During this time we also played scrabble and ate hamburgers. Allie, Angelica, Rangal, Evan, and Jim were all there. It was great fun.
Afterward BA and Vijay came over, and Allie, Angelica, and Vijay left. We started making Eberron characters. Caitlin came a bit late, and started making a character too. We're probably going to start the actual game tomorrow (BA is DMing).
Hurricane Frances is fucking huge. I was looking at satelite pictures today, and from some views the storm covers the entire visible surface of the planet. The eye of the storm is so large that it is expected people will have a two or three hours break from the heavy winds in the center. 2.8 million people were evacuated. Thats about the population of the greater Bay Area, including San Francisco, San Jose, and Oakland.
The Kenedy Space Center is expected to be hit hard, and it is possible that one or more of the Shuttle orbiters may be damaged. It's possible that this combined with the Columbia disaster could spell the permenant end to the STS program. To be honest, I'm not so sure if that would be a bad thing. We could stop spending money on that outdated fleet and start focusing on interplanetary travel once again. I think Bush has the right idea, at least as far as spaceflight goes. As far as fulfilling our obligations for the ISS, I really don't know what to do about that. |
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