Now that I’ve finished the pile of things that I needed to do by Friday, I’m back to being busy, as opposed to really busy.

To recap, there is one week left until spring break, but for some reason, the crunch week was this week. I had the normal homework, in Physics, Calc and Engineering, and a Java program for CS, and the usual English reading. I also had to read the first 200 pages or so of “Saturday Night and Sunday Morning”, and take an turn in notes on the reading. Also due in English was a one page paper about two poems. None of this had been done by Sunday.

I surprised myself, and was able to pull it off, and finish it all. I may not have gotten all the calc homework done, but the rest of the work was actually of good quality, and I even had time to do all the extra-credit Physics problems that there were. Which is good, because I tend to lose points in the homework category.

Today, I’ve been catching up on all the non-critical things I’d ignored the past few days, like laundry. I should have done it Monday evening, or Tuesday. But I didn’t have time, and so today it became critical–I’m wearing my last pair of underwear, and no socks at all. Later last night, I was cleaning up the room, although I still have a dish or two to wash. I plan on doing some of my calc later today, so I can keep from getting in the same boat again next week.

I did accomplish some really non-critical things, though, like clean the dust out of the fan, and I did a bit of a website update Sunday, before I realized the extent of my crush. I think I’m only an associate member of Structured Procrastinators Int’l.

—-

Speaking of the website, I’ve been moving things around a bit. I slightly modified the navbar script so it could do another thing, which was necessary to get the galleries looking the way I wanted. I also have applying what I learn about Java to JavaScript, and have streamlined the code a little bit–it’s now a bit smaller, although 15k is still big for a script. It should run slightly faster, though.

I took down the JavaScripts section of the site, all that was there was a page with a bunch of scripts on it. It was nice for my senior project demonstration, but not really useful after that. I put the Great Expectations part back up, but as part of the high school section. It’s really just a listing of figures of speech, some from the book, and some from elsewhere online. But I feel like keeping it up, so I updated the code to match my new page, and it’s back.

When I organized the galleries, I also posted a few pictures of the whirligig that I made for my Uncle and Aunt at Christmas. It’s on this page.

—-

Nik has had another problem with debit cards. Earlier, a store clerk confiscated the one from his Kansas City bank due to a goof in the Visa computers. Thursday, he got a letter from his bank here saying that he had a negative balance, due to his cash ATM withdrawal of $354 and change. He didn’t have that much in the account, and so he was charged a overdraft fee. The only thing–he didn’t make an ATM withdrawal.

He contacted his bank, and discovered that the withdrawal happened in Romania, so they believe him that he wasn’t the one that made the withdrawal. He’ll get his money back, but the bank needs to do some sort of investigation. As near as he can figure, it was hackers who got his number from some sort of online transaction.

It just occurred to me, though–he picked up a computer virus last Friday and OCIO, the tech people here, shut his computer off from the network due to excessive traffic. He removed the virus as soon as McAfee found it, but there must have been a window where the virus was free to do it’s stuff. The ATM charge happened on Tuesday… I wonder if there is a connection.

—-

It’s international week here, and the big production happens tonight at 6:15, in the commons. I’m not sure what all it is, but from what I hear, it’s been okay in previous years. Dinner is served from 5-7, so I think I’ll head over that way later this evening. I’ll find out how well it goes.

We’ve been having ethnic foods at dinner this week. Japanese Sushi Monday, but I didn’t make it over in time. Thursday was Chinese, including a lion dance during dinner. It was fairly interesting, but the space wasn’t really cut out for it, and the drums made it nearly impossible to hear anyone talk, even from a few feet and when you were on the other side of the room. They had a Chinese dragon, too.

—-
I’ve been getting a fair number of Google hits to my site. Some are more interesting. I got one yesterday, for “pictures of footie socks”. Interesting what people search for. I’ve also been getting a few hits on my blog post dum dum da dum, dum DUM da dum. Apparently, people try and search for using some combination of DUMs and DAs. They wind up with my interpretation of “Here Comes the Bride”.

And on that note, I’ll leave to start doing other stuff.

Later
–Nathan

[Edit 2/27: Fixed a bunch of typos, left to wonder what I was thinking when I wrote ” there is now week is spring break,”, instead of “there is one week left until spring break”.

This evening, night, and tomorrow should be interesting. Tomorrow, I have to turn in a one page “Microtheme” on two poems, and my notes on the first 200 or so pages of a book. I have Physics homework due, and I have to e-mail a CS program to the instructor by midnight. Today, I wrote three programs for my Intro to Engineering lab class.

I’m a good way into the book, and the CS program is complete, and slightly above the requirments, but I haven’t fully tested it. I’m told the Physics HW really isn’t that hard, and I understand this concept much better than the last one, so It should be easier than some assignments. At least I have some time between classes tomorrow.

I should be able to get most of it done, if I work at it. Sleeping is what will be cut short tonight…

So last night was a lot of fun, and rather interesting, too. It was Junior Parents Weekend, so that means that they planned a big activity on campus last night. We had a ‘mentalist’ on campus. Craig Karges is just amazing. He appears to have mental abilities. He was blindfolded, and had members of the audience bring up objects, which he identified. They just held them near his hand. He identified a pair of sunglasses, which wasn’t that impressive. Then the next woman brought up a relative’s blood donor card. Not only did he identify that, but he got the name and blood type correct, too. He needed to handle the card for that, but there’s no raised printing on a blood donor card. Then he had someone bring up a unit of currency. He identified that the guy had brought up a foreign currency, and then read the Serial number, and identified it as a 5 euro bill. I don’t see how it was done. He was blindfolded with two coins taped to his eyes, more tape, and a cloth blindfold over the whole mess. If he had an assistant in the audience somewhere, it’s hard to believe that he could have gotten the serial number. And he offers $100,000 to charity if anyone ever finds out that he uses stooges or hidden cameras/radios in the show.

Later in the show, he levitated a table, with a scarf on the surface between his hand and the table. Then he went into the mind reading portion. He had people concentrate on their initials, a piece of personal info, and a random thought. He then would pick a thought, or set of initials, ask people with those initials to stand, and he told two people their phone numbers, read several of their random thoughts, including “Brady is hott!”, “lime jello”, and “frogs”. HE knew the names of the people they were sitting next to, and their signs. One girl thought she knew her sign, and he informed her that given her date and year of birth, which she hadn’t told him but he got correct, she was a cusp person, born between two signs. ]

Then he had three people write a number in a book, and had a fourth add them up. He got a hinged chalkboard, put a small piece of chalk inside, gave it to an audience member, and told them to hold it horizontal. After a few seconds, it was reopened, and the number inside matched the sum of the three numbers.

He asked four audience members to assist in creating a car, each in charge of a different component. Then he pulled out of a zipped pocket in his wallet, which was inside his jacket, a sealed envelope with a piece of paper, on which was written the exact make, model, color, license plate number, and cost of this car. It’s possible that this was sleight of hand, but unlikely.

He borrowed three rings from audience members, and linked them in a chain, and unlinked them. The owners of the rings were onstage to see them unlinked.

He asked for his check, had an audience member put it in an envelope, and seal it. The volunteer then sealed blank pieces of paper in two more envelopes. They were then numbered, and then the volunteer chose an envelope to give to Craig. From the remaining two, the volunteer chose one. Craig shredded, on the spot with a shredder, both the envelopes he was holding, and lo and behold, it was the check.

Wow, I’ve been ranting for quite a while about it, but he was good. It just blows your mind. He claims to have no supernatural powers, and reminds us several times, that it was a show, he was just an entertainer. He’s one heck of an entertainer, I’ll tell you that!

Shortly after we got back from the show, several people decided to make a Cove run, and I went along. While everyone was at the cove, it was decided that there should be a game of sardines in Franz Hall. (Franz has classrooms, and staff offices, as well as a few common areas, and a coffee bar. There are several alcoves in which to hide, all over the building, which is four floors and a basement.) So once everyone had eaten, off we went. We’d picked up a few extra people by then, and numbered 18. So we played a few games of sardines.

For those who have never played sardines, there is one person who hides somewhere, and the rest try and find the person. But when you find the person, instead of ending the game, you hide with them. Depending on the hiding space, that can be interesting, although people tended to pick good, large hiding spots. The first person to find the hid hides the next turn.

By midnight, we were pretty much burned out on the game, having been playing since 10:30 or 11:00. It’s just as well, as P-safe comes to lock up the building at midnight. So we all went outside, and decided that we should watch a movie. Somehow over the course of the game, the movie “The Princess Bride” was mentioned, and they were rather surprised/outraged that a few people, including me, hadn’t seen it. So we ended up watching it. It’s an interesting movie, I wouldn’t call it a classic or anything, but it wasn’t nearly as ‘chick fickish’ as it sounds. I enjoyed it. So I came back to the room late, and wound up going to bed somewhere after 3.

I got up earlier this morning, to go over and see the College Bowl thing. As part of Junior parent weekend, they set up college bowl as Students vs. Parents. At our last meeting, before Christmas, the man in charge of College bowl invited us back to help, as he wasn’t sure how many students would be there. I ended up competing in two of the five rounds, one of which we won by a large margin, the other we lost 95 – 0. Which is only about 3 questions worth, but it was still bad as it was the tie-breaker round. I guess the parents are smarter than the students. Or maybe just older. Some of the questions they got just because they lived through the events. I couldn’t name the five summer Olympic locations in North America, but I bet they remembered reading about them as they happened, mostly. Anyway, it was fun.

On the way back from the College bowl, I was riding my bike back to Villa. I decided to go a longer route, around a few buildings, to avoid all the people walking from the building. I was outside Swindells (a building), near the road to get to Waldschmidt and behind Kenna. The sidewalk is pretty wide, and can be used as a road if you need to get to some of the buildings. TO keep people from driving places they don’t want them to, there are several black steel posts which set into holes into the pavement. The holes are about a foot in diameter. The posts can be removed, to allow vehicles to pass. I was riding, and wanted to pass between the poles and turn onto the sidewalk just beyond. I rode right between the two poles, and started my turn. I wasn’t going super fast, but I wasn’t just coasting, either.

Anyway, what I failed to notice was that this particular sidewalk was set up for three posts, and one had been removed. I rode right over the hole, and as my wheel was turned, fell over the bike. I wasn’t hurt, except for my palm, but I’ve scraped it worse just falling while walking. I went to get back on my bike, and discovered that my handlebars must not have been totally tight, and were rotated about 30 degrees. So I had to pull on them to get them back towards straight. I rode back to Villa, and straightened them back out the rest of the way.

So that’s been my last 24 hours or so. Not a lot happening here…

I just got a Google hit on one of my blog archives. The hit was from Iran! And they were searching for the word “brofe”. I think that must mean something to them, but to me, it’s just what happens when you carelessly try and type “broke” and confuse the K for the F. I’ve always had that problem occasionally, switching those two characters when typing. Don’t ask why, I can’t tell you.

I think I’ll start using the spell checker more often….

I remember seeing this on someone else’s blog, and I thought I’d try it here.

Tell me a few things you want to see pictures of, and I will post them. My desk, Franz Hall, my bike, my left shoe, whatever. In all honesty, I’m interested to see what (if aything) is requested.

—-

Yesterday seems to have been the day for my site ot hit it big with the search engines. I got 2 different hits on “Nathan Oliver” from google, and discovered that nathan oliver, even without quotes, is the number 10 page returned by Google, putting it on the first page. I also got 3 hits in my joke pages, including (strangely enough) two people searching on the exact text of the joke. I even got a hit on the search nathanoliver.com, which isn’t my address. Not quite sure how that happened. The last hit was a search for the name of one of the people I mentioned in the Track it Down piece.

—-

I hate laundry. I did 5 loads today. All my clothes fit into 3, and then I washed my sweatshirts in the 4th and my sheet and towels in the 5th. We actually have a linen exchange here, but the bath towels are too small, and they don’t have fitted sheets. If I don’t have a fitted sheet, I have to completely re-make the bed every other day or so, and that’s impractical for a loft.

—-

I’m not feeling particularly inspired today, so I’ll call that the entire post. I may do an Audioblog again, but I think I’ll need to think up some content. I can’tjust ramble on about it being my second test, and when speaking publicly, I need to develop a script to be coherent. Yes, I consider the phone to be public–I’m horrible at leaving a message unless I’ve planned ahead what the message will say. Anyone that’s gotten a clear message from me has had a hang-up as the caller just before.

But enough rambling….