tonight i met up with kate who's home for the weekend... and we were both in a movie mood. we went out and saw the incredibles... the new pixar flick. wow... it was pretty nuts. i don't know if i can say it's my fav... i still think monsters inc. is my top pick... but this one is takes cgi to a different level. it's got funny, it's got action, it's got some cute, but it's the first one with "humans" as the main characters. i think they did a good job overall. it's really worth seeing in the theater.

hmmm... i'm just waiting til dec 14th... i'm using one of my gift cards and going out to get the return of the king extended edition dvd. i need to pick up a copy of the new u2 as well.

that's all for now... night.

I am looking for motivation of all shapes and sizes; from classical to contemporary periods, ASAP. Top $$$ paid guaranteed! Condition not important. Email with offers. Thanks.


eh... if only it were that easy to purchase.

so it's 4am, and i just got home. i totally don't remember what it feels like to do this late night/early morning going out deal. i think the last time i pulled one of these was last new years, and as i said in the previous post, i haven't gone out out in like a month. i am both an old man and homebody... but i had fun tonight, and i'm still awake. there were a ton of people out downtown, saw a lot of the old crew, and people i didn't expect to see. it's all good... so i think i'll go to sleep, do some orgo, have some turkey, and go to sleep again in a few hours. hope everyone has an enjoyable thanksgiving!

the best part about not living in new york... i get the big picture. i love being outside and being able to see the sun set against a blue fall sky. no, better yet, i love being outside and being able to see THE SKY when i step outside.

look what i found. can you believe that? it's like a frequent buyers program for drugs! i mean seriously, they're just asking for it to be used recreationally. they should just make all drugs legal. people with ed should just use coke, i bet they'll have a much better time ummm... doing it.

what would you do with $149 million dollars (~$90 million after taxes)? i could probably make a dent in my nyu loans... yes, only a dent sad but true.

man, i think even taiwan got rid of the whole corporal punishment thing in schools some time ago. you know you're behind when the asians aren't even raising their kids with the bamboo.

didn't they just raise the price of stamps 2 weeks ago?

people are coming home for thanksgiving, i'm gonna head out tonight... it's going to be nice. i haven't done anything fun in over a month, and i haven't seen anyone. i've been locked up studying (ok, maybe pretending to study)... but the pcats are over, and the labs and semester's winding down. i think i'm gonna take my gre's in dec. i might as well, as my mind is still in standardized test mode. it's just the pcats minus the bio, chem, and calc.

more later.

so i got a call this afternoon from one of my credit card companies looking to sign me up for one of them identity theft/credit protection dealies. you notice that they don't ask you if you want to sign up anymore? they just call you up and TELL you they're signing you up. normally i don't like dealing with the hassle, and i just say yes, and i recieve the info and i cancel after i get the package or whatever. today, i totally wasn't in the mood. so i told the guy that i didn't want it. of course he gives me sales pitch after sales pitch, and i tell him he doesn't have to sell me on the service. he promptly answers that he's not selling me a service, so i ask if the thing in question is a service, he answers, "yes." i ask if i already have this "service", and he responds with a "no." so i ask, how this isn't the selling of a service? he hangs up after a moment of silence and a flustered huff, which kinda surprised me, as usually isn't it normal for the "customer" to hang up and not the other way around? in any case, i felt good that i stayed on the line and made HIM hang up. i've always liked doing that to people though, it's one of weird attributes i guess. i absolutely have a blast getting prank calls, cause i'll just stay on the line until the other party hangs up, and the best is when they hang up and i don't so when they pick up the phone again they get a warm "hello" from me. i don't know what my fascination is with pushing people's buttons, but it's just so much fun sometimes. of course, i try really hard not to actually hurt people and cross the line, but i'll push right up to the line. getting back to the credit card services, i guess technically they're not selling anything, cause they didn't ask, i suppose technically they're just signing people up, which i think is much more annoying than sales calls. they're kinda like, "we're giving you this, just say yes so i can record it. thanks." at least with a sales call, you can work in a "no" because the person actually pauses after a sentence, so you don't feel rude for interrupting.

so that's my rant for the day... hmm... the pcats went ok... i'm not thrilled, but i think i did well on the verbal and reading. i'm especially happy with the reading, as i was never able to get through 6 passages of text and answering questions about them in the practice tests i took. the math sec was a little more time consuming than i expected, so i guessed on a bunch of stuff. the chem had a little more orgo than i was expecting too, which is bad for me cause i'm not even done with the first semester of it yet. i also wrote prehaps the shitties essay i have ever written for the last section. i totally feel it's wrong to have a 30 min essay section after you've taken a test for 4.5 hours. i was looking at the 2 sentences that gave the essay topic and it frickin took me like 20 minutes to figure out what the essay was supposed to be about. i suppose it turns out how everyone else did, we'll see in 4- 6 weeks.

i've got an anatomy & physiology test tonight, i'm pretty prepared for that. i have a physics exam tomorrow, i'm not prepared for that.

some interesting stuff...

hope you new yorkers got to see u2 for FREE in brooklyn today. i'm so jealous.

some more real estate stuff on buffalo. i so want to buy this house in elmwood. i have no money to do it though =[. anyone want to buy it for me? speaking of which, i just found out today that buffalo's been craigslisted too. now all we need is someone to -ist us... ummmm... buffist perhaps?

contrast buffalo with california real estate. i could never ever buy a house in california, but all you guys out there should just move to buffalo. we have snow just like you! you'll have to wait for our snow though, we can still see grass out here. plus you can move to amherst where i grew up... which is the 4th safest city in the US this year.

2 tech links... jesus, we're almost up to 1/2 a terabyte of storage on personal computers! my first computer only had 20 megs of it back in the 80s. that's only 0.005% of a 400 GB hard drive!

don't counterfeit anything unless you deactivate the serial number encoder thingy.

lastly, i'm pretty excited... i got this present for a friend... it might be one of the coolest things i've ever bought for anyone. hopefully they'll get it soon.

that's it for now.

what is wrong with him? clinton always looks cool & composed, bush always looks... ummm... riiiight. 

pcats this sat, and an assortment of other tests in the next 2 weeks, some more school, and finals immediately following. at this point in the semester, i always feel an anticipation to get it all over with, but i'm always hesitant @ the same time, kinda like a "oh crap, the semester is almost over. i better get my crap together!" feeling.

i'm actually thinking... i might just end up staying in nyc awhile longer so i can travel up to boston and down to philly to visit mass. college of pharm & temple university. the advantage of being in the city is i can take the riceboy chinatown bus to each city for like $3.50 roundtrip. i know they have a bus that goes to d.c., but i wonder if they have one that goes to baltimore? in any case, i can nail down 3 school visits (liu will be the easiest as i'll already be in brooklyn) if i stay 2-3 days longer in new york maybe?

i'm adding this to my to-do list when i go to the city this time. i don't know if they'll still have the same pie lineups, as pumpkin pie is a pretty seasonal pie... but i'll settle for a good apple pie. part of the yummyness of pies are because they are seasonal, so my favorites change with the seasons. peach, apple, pumpkin. i'm not a fan of the cherry pies, in fact i'm not a big fan of cherry anything in general, but i'll readily eat fresh cherries. you know what else is good? cobbler... peach, apple, blueberry.

so we have to fcc to regulate our television programming, and the mpaa to regulate our movies... but who regulates our books? we especially need book regulation for children! our children are being subjected to reading violence! it needs to stop! yes i'm being sarcastic. i think i posted a long time ago on book violence... but in light of what the fcc/mpaa are doing these days, i just find it funny (but not really) that childrens books can get away with much more deviant acts.

the 2 (3) things that suck for the day... abercrombie & the house republicans (& delay gets a special mention).

how would you've liked to have made 10x your money in a year and a half? after emerging from bankruptcy last year, kmart's stock debut @ a little over $12/share. over the year it has risen above $100, and today, they announced they were buying out sears roebuck. on the news, kmart's stock jumped to the $120/share level. there was speculation that kmart was going to exit the retail biz and turn into a holding and investment company similar to buffet's berkshire hathaway, as they divested their stores and properties maximizing stock profit returns for investors. well, it's pretty apparent if they're buying sears, they aren't thinking about exiting the biz, but staying in the game to better compete with the likes of wal-mart.

smelly german co-workers are annoying. ja, sie stinken. es ist nicht nur deutsche.

das ist alles, gutten nacht... bis morgen.

so this past week featured the launch of torontoist! pretty exciting indeed... now i can go to a central site for all the good stuff happening in and around metro toronto. apparently i'm also the food person of the site, but i'm really not... it's a bizarro me.

maybe (hopefully) i'll be able to head up in the following weeks... it's been years since i've been there for boxing day... though it probably won't be as beneficial for me as the canadian dollar is strengthening against the flacid US dollar. at least i can hit up the hmv and get some canadian standards, so i don't have to pay import prices here, and get the gst & pst refunded @ the border. speaking of which, i still haven't gotten the new low album... how is it? they're playing 2 shows next week in buffalo.

i've been putting off calling the credit card companies... i finally decided to do it today. i always hate the games you have to play. i don't think i have an excessive number of cards, but i like simple... and while i was working... somehow i ended up with 4. there hasn't been a balance on 3 of the 4 in a long time. the one i have always been using was my american airlines card... so i figured i didn't need the others. the only thing with my aa card is there's an annual fee with it, but you can get them to waive or put a credit to your account if you call up and are like, "i don't know if i want this card, etc." so this year, i just asked if they could waive my fee. i wasn't in the mood for the games... so they issued a credit. before this all went down... i called up one of the other banks that issued me a card that i haven't used in probably 2 years and i said i wanted to cancel my card. those persistant people though, got me to transfer my account to a "double platinum" card (now they have to start doubling on the transition metals? it's kinda like the razors now... with 16 blades so you can shave your facial hair AND 20 other people's at the same time.) anyways... this card has no fee, plus i get earn 2 mi/$ with no blackout dates. so... i think i'll see what's up and what airlines i can fly on. if it's not like valujet i think i'll probably use the new one as my primary card and cancel my aadvantage card as i almost have enough to redeem my miles for tix. it'll be less of a hassle, i won't have to call up and ask for a credit for my annual fee, and i'll get 2 mi/$.

i think the whole thing is just ridiculous though, the run around these credit card companies give you. if you seriously had the will to do it, i bet you could get them to cancel all your debt. all you'd have to do is call them up and tell them that "this other bank beats their rates/fee/whatever, do better or i'm going to them." don't you wish that sometimes they'd just do something FOR you instead of you having to run through circles to get it? i mean, we all know they're trying to screw you with as much as they can get away with before you tell them to stop. how nice would it be if they just set you up in the beginning with their best offer? well... that's my rant for the day... capitalism can be good cause competition does good things, but since money is the bottom line, you have to put up with a bunch of b.s. in the process.

go badgers!

abc's doing a segment on world news tonight on monday on adderall (an add/adhd drug). it's becoming a popular drug to take to help study/boost test scores apparently. i saw preview to the segment tonight, of course they're interviewing some asian kid (big surprise right?) anyways... maybe i should try it out... but i also do think i have a legitimate case of add... kinda.

here's a funny story on gothamist. apparently someone got into the LED display system and changed the message from your generic 'Please Stand Clear of the Moving Platform'. if i saw the message... it would've totally made my day. nyc is such a good place for randomness... but more like weird randomness, and for the most part randomness=funny.

i frickin hate the fcc... they totally need to suck it.

the doctor just made many women who wouldn't mind implanting electrodes or whatever into their body pretty happy. jeez, no work needed... while men will still have to work.

fish be singin' too when they be gettin some.

so it sounds like most of the ol buff crew is gonna spend new years in the city. i guess that's where i'll be going too. anyone want to give me a ride? or should i just plan on buying tix from jet blue? it should be fun though... i haven't done a new years with buffalo people in a long time... and hopefully we'll get a good amount of nyc crew to show too!

play

it's been unrelenting lately
permeating waking thoughts
into unconscious sleep
a brief moment of suspended harmony
in perfect balance
only to be jarred
with the opening of an eyelid
followed by the other
as i find myself back in reality
and wishing for my next escape

18 hours left & counting...
rewind.

yes... we voted to stay the course, and further destabalize iraq. GOOD for US! (or should i say, halliburton and other american companies gobbling up the contracts to rebuild iraq?) boy... aren't we a buncha assholes?!

the loonie & twonies are making their moves.

good for canada, there really is a widening gap developing between the US and canada. unfortuntately i'm in the country where we're going in the wrong direction.

and still people don't think we need a good environmental policy.

we need to design friendlier neighborhoods, streets, towns, villages, cities, for biking, walking, and general commuting. it should be better balanced for car use, and non-car use. i still remember when a bike was all i needed. it'd be a 15-20 minute ride to bern's house... and i knew all the shortcuts. it'd be another 5-10 more to jeff's... and ravi's was really far away... probably like 35-40 total. good thing i didn't know aaron at the time... bad things probably would've happened out in deliverance country.

mozilla 1.0 is out! download it here. the best feature? {ctrl-t} for tabbed browsing.

submit your own picture and apologize.

physics came up to me to apologize... but it was a fake apology... fingers crossed and everything. i hate that fucker.

that's all.

how many days can a person take of sitting in physics lecture and not know what's going on? apparently a person can take many days of it... as i'm doing so right now. i sit in class and i'm thinking, "wtf?!" the whole entire time. i "read" the text, and i'm thinking, "wtf?!". when i'm doing the homework, it's a buncha... yup... "wtf?!". i don't want to create anymore gaussian surfaces for electric and magnetic fields! i don't even think i know what a gaussian surface is! i think it's something we've been doing all semester too! NO MORE EPSILON NOT! or MU NOT or integrating along 3d axis! i will have none of it anymore! i'm done... i'm cutting you off physics! i don't want to make sense of the physical world... i don't care. things never work out right anyways! life sucks... and then you die. that's all there is to it... physics... ya frickin jerk!

nyc marathon... i think it'd just be cool to do it... with the hundreds of other people plus it's the only time you can get over the narrows bridge without a car. it'll be tiring... but damn... it'd be cool to say i covered a little over 26 miles on foot in one go. i'm just gonna keep on getting older and my knees aren't gonna get any better... might as well do it while i still can right?

it's been a long 2 weeks... i can finally sorta kinda take a breath now. i can't say i'm ecstatic with the results/coming results of my tests... but it's all my fault anyways. procrastinator extrordinare... that would be me. man... i messed up orgo last night. it didn't help with the election this past week either... just this ball of tension on the eve... and a bigger ball of tension after the results.

i did talk to one of my classmates though... she took the pcat either last weekend or 2 weekends ago. she said it wasn't as hard as the kaplan practice tests... so that's a good sign. that comes up in 2 weeks... along with a physics test.

i went to church tonight for the first time in forever. i got kinda fed up with it all as the election neared... there are both kerry and bush supporters at eastern hills weseleyan of course... but i just couldn't take the pro bush people anymore... so i disconnected myself for a little bit.

it was nice this afternoon... it's been raining a lot lately. i had wanted to go out and take some fall pics. my plan was to hit up the north campus @ ub... and get and post some pics of baird point, the trees & leaves as you walk up towards the performing arts center from millersport, and just surrounding landscape with the blue skies, sun peeking through the clouds, and all that. then i got hungry and caught up in the wisconsin minnesota game. the badgers are 9-0 now! camp radall was jumping. i wonder where i'd be @ now if i had gone to wisconsin for for undergrad. maybe i'd actually like alcohol since it's the like only thing to drink up there? probably would've gone overboard with the stoner thing (that is... more so than nyu). anyways... wisconsin won... got the axe back from minnesota... and will hopefully run the table for the rest of the season.

i looked up kerry on the senate.gov site, and sent him an message thanking him for his effort these last months... and asking him, as one of the most senior members of congress to continue to fight against the bad ideas of the extreme right (not that he wouldn't, but i hope he doesn't fold up and disappear like many who've lost big races have done in the past). not that he'll even read the message... but... it made me feel better... if we can hold the line... and as these old pro-bush conservative people die off in the next 4 years... and the democrats can come up with a decent vision... they'll be set up for the next race.

so that's it. i'm tired and i've got a bunch of stuff to take care of tomorrow... but at least i don't have to worry about any tests this next week.

"Too many good docs are getting out of the business. Too many OB-GYNs aren't able to practice their love with women all across this country." —George W. Bush, Poplar Bluff, Mo., Sept. 6, 2004

just some stuff.

-new america

-marryanamerican.ca ;]

-the slower way
here's an article about that.

-employment in canada

so i was checking out gothamist just now... and i look over to the right hand column... and i see... laura? i'm thinking to myself, wtf is she doing there? she got interviewed apparently... good for her! she's funny... the fifth dentist is funny... i miss funneling all my pay to support her and her pals for their bringer shows. no... seriously though, if you get a chance to check her stand up out in new york... really do it. you won't regret it. maybe you'll catch her on a night that she incorporates some funny stocham bits into her routine.

i'm more frustrated than angry. in fact, any bad feelings aren't even necessarily directed to bush. i just see him as a dumbass with good campaign advisors. the negative feelings i have go toward the 51% of the american public that voted for bush. i am appalled and embarrassed that a majority of people would vote for greed, limiting civil liberties and freedom, no firearm controls, the deaths of over 100,000 civilians in iraq, destruction of the environment, integration of church and state, division of the class, race, sex, sexual orientation, and the list goes on. yes, the election was close, and there was almost a 1:1 ratio of pro bush to pro kerry. however, when i think that for every kerry supporter, there is 1.06 of a bush supporter, that is what i am worried about.

there are two ways to attain peace, and only one way to attain lasting peace. the first way is what we are doing now in the world, through force. using force may work for a little while, but does not bode well after a certain period of time. empires ALWAYS fall, history is proof of that. the second way is through cooperation and gradual change. it's less shocking, and allows for all people involved to adjust to the changes.

so what now? well, we're probably going to move backwards over the next four years, seeing how the republicans ALSO control the senate and the house (in fact they gained on their majority). there are two situations that i could see happening that might possibly leave us better off over the long term. the first, as i mentioned before, watching america go to shit. it'd be a very painful process, but most times, self-inflicted wounds result in a lesson learned and an error never repeated again. the second, because the republicans picked up seats in both houses of congress, and added some very conservative leaning leaders, there's a possibility that they start getting big heads, and believe they have a mandate to push america further to the right. this could cause a gradual splitting of the republican party between the moderates and the extremists (presently, there is already a divide between the old conservatives and the neo-cons). these divisions could bring the republican party back towards the center in the future, which a larger population might find more appealing. of course, this is all hypothetical, all things i can see happening, and leaving us better off in the long term.

the last option... move away. one of the benefits of a global economy is the ability to work elsewhere (australia's really far away from this mess). with an education and/or skills it's fairly easy to get a visa into another country. so this doesn't change the plan that's been in my head for some time now... hop over the border into canada... where the values of the country are more inline with my own expectations of how a country should be run. maybe in the end, others will do the same thing, and we can all watch as america tries to recover after most of its college educated skilled labor leave their jobs and are replaced by bud-drinking, wife-beating, nascar watching, w.t. neeee-haw!

i'm gonna be pissed... and it says now that you're tilting to bush... damn you. i'm hoping for a late surge from all you people up north by and around cleveland who had to wait a long time to vote. i'm praying you didn't get frustrated and go home.

i guess i'm preparing myself for defeat anyways... the ignorance of the american people is a very hard thing to overcome. religious ideology should not factor into the political process of a nation that prides itself on freedom of religion and a seperation of church and state. of course, my faith that people will be able to see the disparity between the freedoms they value, and how they vote is just too great i guess. when polls come out a couple weeks before this election showing the majority of americans ill-informed on the stances of the candidates, disheartens me as well. we have such great potential, and we squander it with our own ignorance.

my heart's in it for kerry... but... if that doesn't happen... there is a part of me that wants bush to win. it's the really twisted part of me though. that part wants bush to win, and have everything go to hell, just so i can laugh and say "i told you so, you have no one to blame but yourselves." evil... yes, but it would feel so good to say.

John Hay Jr. serves the West Morris Street Free Methodist Church of Indianapolis, Indiana, as senior pastor. He has directed Horizon House, the city's homeless day center, and worked extensively with urban neighborhood revitalization. He offers these seven principles to consider when voting:


1. I ask of any candidate's or administration's positions and proposals, "What does it do to the poor?"

2. I do not expect the American president to be a Christian or my brand of Christian.

3. I recognize that the priorities of the kingdom of God and the agendas of American presidents and governments are not the same.

4. I look for a candidate who I think will lead compassionately, not just talk about compassion.

5. I recognize that most "all-or-nothing" issues cast during election campaigns are NOT "all-or-nothing."

6. I ask, "How has a candidate responded to violence or used violence? And how does he or she plan to respond to and use it in the future?"

7. I consider how candidates envision America's place and role in the world.

VOTE! it's important! us young people really need to come out and cast our ballots. we are the unknown variable in this election. us, with the cell phones who are unreachable by the pollsters. our future is being decided tomorrow. this is for our own jobs down the line, our kids, our parents, our education, our health. things can change a lot in 4 years, look at where we are today from 4 years ago! we're in bad shape now, but we can certainly turn it around. let's make this a surprising landslide victory for kerry!

BE HEARD! VOTE!