Everybody Cut Everybody Cut Everyone CUT FOOTLOOSE

Was rockin out to the Footloose soundtrack driving back up here to UCSB, one of the handful of tapes I grabbed from my room on the way out due to my car not being blessed with a CD player... Lots of bouncy songs on there, gonna have to dl a bunch.

The Big Game was today, and was strangely more exciting than usual, given the usual two touchdown point spread. Turned out the underdogs were the victors, always a good thing to see. The Rams won one recently anyway, someone else's turn. :)

Exciting part of the transit to and from LA this weekend was noticing they FINALLY completed the road work in the Sepulveda pass and there is now a carpool lane southbound all the way through. Quite the welcome sight for the traffic hater.

Alas, this has become the mini paragraph post, mainly because I have a Stat midterm tomorrow that I need to get studyin for. :/

I'll Always Be A Warrior...

Man, tiring day. Nothing like talking and talking and talking and talking until you're actually BORED of talking. For me, that obviously takes qutie a bit of effort. Phew. Got back from another yearly day of Academic Decathlon a little while ago, and had a blast as always. Had a couple awesome interviewees, some mediocre, and some pretty terrible, always fun to see the broad spectrum of upcoming talent. I'm an alumni of the West High Warriors, and they performed well as is the tradition, looking strong going into Friday's banquet when all the results and final overall rankings will be announced. I'm cheerin especially hard for em, if they go on to the State competition (this was County) they'll travel to Modesto, and I'll have an excuse to take a weekend and head North to visit all the friendlies up there while I'm taking in the competition. :)

Actually made me feel pretty old today, those high schoolers are gettin littler and littler. :/ Scarier still is the fact it was my 5th straight year going to Carrows for the after-party given I competed for two years and it was my third year judging... What a phogie I'm becoming. Looks like I'll be hanging around here tomorrow for the Super Bowl festivities, and drive up afterwards tomorrow night at some point. Midterm the next afternoon, so will definitely be back by then. :)

Once again a big congrats to everyone on AD from West, especially the amazingly intelligent sole returner and current keeper of the perfect 10 flame. :) (don't ask)

One Down, Umpteen To Go.

Umpteen is a lot. Really. Anyway, managed to nail my first midterm today after nearly sleeping through the start of it, then having to run to the UCen to buy the blue book I forgot to bring... All's well that ends well I guess. Only about five or six more midterms to go this quarter, I think.

Pretty routine day, will be heading home tomorrow (er today I guess now) at some point and be busy all day Saturday judging the Academic Decathlon competition, and then either hang around at home to watch the Super Bowl or head back up here to watch it, who really knows for sure. Planning things before the day of all the time just gets too old. :)

*(!&@#^!*@#&^ AAAANNNTTTSSSSS!!!!!!!!

Pardon my friends, but nothing like waking up this morning, rolling out of bed onto my chair to check my e-mail, and noticing several ants crawling over my hands, and as my view focuses, literally THOUSANDS crawling all over my desk. Apparently someone had left a half eaten box of licorice on the far end of it yesterday, and overnight it became just a feeding frenzy for most of UCSB's population of ants. After completely clearing everything out, having the whole trail and various gathering places sprayed along with all their access points in the hallway, vacuuming the whole room, and rearranging everything again, I've reduced the invasion to a random explorer here and there that is readily squashed.

Ants are quite annoying.

Don't get me wrong, I like many types of animals, but I'm also a firm believer in survival of the fittest, so I have no problem eating meat or eliminating insects that create negative consequences. Like disease. Ew.

Tools of the Trade...

Was tipped off by a friend the other night about how to easily work around that annoying limit of 150 buddies on your AOL Instant Messenger list, and I invite anyone curious as to how its done to IM me personally for details. Set mine to 999, that should be fine for now. :)

My screenname is thndrMATT as always, the THUNDER is for everyone who knows me online (scary how many that is) and the MATT is well, you should know by now.

Those of you who don't know me, feel free to say hi, I'm always up for meeting new random people from around the world. Crazy thing, this internet business.

I Wish I May I Wish I Might...

So I've been browsing around the internet as I tend to do looking for el cheapo auctions for the products on my "wish list" so to speak... So for all those of you millionaires with money to blow in the vicinity of my birthday in May, I recommend the following items: Viewsonic VP230mb flat panel monitor, and Klipsch Promedia 5.1 speakers. The speakers are only 400 bucks retail, and still new enough that they're not falling anywhere below that even at auction. The behemoth of a monitor (its 23.1 inch VIEWABLE) is valued at about 4 grand at the moment, and its prices hasn't exactly been dropping through the floor either. Would be quite the awesome purchase however, my current monitor is 18.1 viewable, but it isn't PF (perfect flat) and takes up about 2 feet of depth as well, whereas the one that's 5 inches bigger would take up a foot LESS of desk space, which is at a premium these days. My current monitor was purchased soon after I came to college, so I've gotten a good 3 years or so of 24/7 usage, pretty good shelf life for a monitor. It suits my needs I suppose, but there's always something bigger and better out there. :)

While we're on the geek topic, the other reason a flat panel would much improve my lifestyle is that it would be easier to pack for the journey to Mesquite, Texas, this summer for the annual Quakecon event. 99% of the people who read this won't know what the hell Quakecon is, but its basically the largest multiplayer pc gaming event in the world, drawing thousands of participants from all over the world every year. Call it a geek convention if you like, but its a strong interest of mine, and it will be quite awesome to spend a long weekend having a blast for four straight days with no sleep with people who are like minded. The reservations have been made at the hotel connected to the convention center where it will be held, luckily because I happened across a site that leaked the dates and managed to snag one of the last rooms available even before it was officially announced yet. So if you're looking for me between Aug 14-19, I'll probably be either there, or on the road, making the twenty four hour or so non-stop journey between my home near Los Angeles and the grand state of Texas. Luckily planning to go with a few companions so as to share the rental car/gas/hotel costs, and driving shifts.

Still in the initial planning stages, but between that and my Vegas trip sometime this spring/early summer, its shaping up to be a pretty incredible year.

"How's It Goin"

The above greeting was what aroused me from my early afternoon slumber, hadn't the foggiest day who it was until she spoke again, and I figured out it was my most recent ex-girlfriend. Phone calls from her are always a random surprise, there tend to be six month or so gaps between communications, for reasons I'm not entirely sure I understand. Anyway, was good to exchange barbs and giggles with her for the first time in a while. As usual she tossed around rumors of making the trek down to Santa Barbara at some point in the future, but those tend to evaporate soon after they're mentioned.

Went to the California Pizza Kitchen tonight, or CPK as aficionados call it, and ate way too much Jambalaya, and shared a yummy Apple Crisp on top of that. Definitely gonna be hittin the workout room before this night is over. :)

Midterms start Tuesday for me, I've got about one a week for the next six weeks or something, pretty lame, but I'm sure I'll find time to schedule in fun along the way.

A Brunette That's Not Really...

Managed to wake up early enough today to head to the theater with an old friend, and discovered the only movie playing at that time was A Walk to Remember the new movie starring Mandy Moore. Seeing her as a non-blonde was an improvement at least. I actually thought it was going to be much lamer than it actually was, I'd go with about 4 M's. Quite a sweet movie for the vicinity of Valentine's Day though, I'm sure its much cuter as a date movie though than as a "wow wouldn't that be cool if" movie.

Spent some time going through old pics later, including some from waaaaay back in the day when I met her freshman year in high school, back when I was 130 lbs and could run a 5 minute mile... Man, what a stick. I had like no shoulders to speak of, just this long neck and huge looking ears, not sure what happened between them and now. I think the focal point just moved to my double chin, or something. :/

Weekends just keep getting shorter, not sure where the time goes. Sometimes its nice to just sit around and vegetate.

I'd also like to go on record saying ergonomics keyboards are quite annoying when you're not used to them. The B is on the wrong side for me, and that totally screws up my rhythm. Urg.

If I Could Fall, Into The Sky...

Gonna have to bust out a plug for Vanessa Carlton and her single A Thousand Miles, it absolutely rocks my world. Watched her play it live on MTV yesterday, and I'm always totally impressed by people who can play an instrument so incredibly well. They showed like 500 closeups of her fingers flying across the keyboard, basically blurred. Also has quite the infectious melody, and pretty cool lyrics to boot, including the one in the heading. That would be sweet, suddenly everyone on Earth launching up into space as if gravity suddenly reversed itself. Well it would be sweet until we all came crashing down anyway. :)

Spent some time up in Solvang for several hours today wandering around, its a Danish style town about a half hour north of here, with tons of shops and bakeries and little cozy nooks, basically looks like Fantasyland from Disneyland. Wandering around I discovered that its the most perfect place to go gift shopping for people at, I literally found stuff in like half the stores that would work out well. Going to have to head that direction next time I feel the need to give away random presents.

Also started playing Medal of Honor: Allied Assault, which thus far although I've only been through a few missions seems pretty incredible. Awesome AI and set pieces have caused it to be quite enjoyable, and I haven't even reached the apparent INCREDIBLE D-Day sequence that has brought oohs and ahhs from the masses. Been playin a bunch of FIFA 2002 lately as well, took over the USA in a run for the World Cup, pretty fun stuff. :)

Anyway will have plenty of time for all this during the weekend, also planning on keeping the swimming thing going since I missed today (was actually doing and better yet, TURNING IN my homework!!@!!~@~!) and who knows, maybe getting some work done.

Yeah. Uh huh.

Day to Day to Day...

Just an update for the sake of updating, pretty dullsville around here lately, just going about my regular day to day business. Did finish off Red Faction, a game that has a pretty high level for the sake of blowing stuff up, but isn't on the same level as Wolf or Ghost Recon. Planning to take on Medal of Honor: Allied Assault next, a game that's gotten rave reviews from both gaming critics and my fellow hallmates as they've been glued to their comps for a few days now hammering away at the single player campaign... I tend to wait for the weekend for such an endeavor, too busy studying and all meanwhile. :)

Crap, Valentine's Day again. Three weeks, no pressure. For a long time it was a special time of year for me, since it was a couple days after my last relationship's anniversary. After that its been largely me myself and a good book, computer game, movie, or something of the sort. Any fellow boycotters out there need a buddy? I see no shame in spreading love amongst friends, which is I suppose the overall point anyway.

A Yummy Flavor of Sky...

Hung out with a couple of my third floor buddies today and went to go check out Vanilla Sky... Going to have to give that one four M's, and about an 8 on a weirdness scale of 10. Quite a trippy movie, for a number of reasons. I did enjoy the actor's performances, and Cruz isn't too bad looking and thus makes up for Diaz, but as usual the trippy aspect of the movie caused me problems. Was interesting looking at all the upcoming movie posters though and seeing a war movie with Mel Gibson, another with Nicholas Cage, and another with Bruce Willis all featured. Obviously a genre that is touching a lot of people more than usual these days, looks like we'll be getting our fill of them shortly.

Highlight of the evening was going to KMart for the first time in a while, and witnessing technology taking over... They no longer have checkout people there, its totally self serve. This is mainly because everything is now computer based, you walk up, scan your own items, feed in the cash or card, bag them yourself, and walk away, all while under the survelliance of a camera above each station. Possibly the coolest thing I've ever seen in a convenience store, but it drew looks of horror from both my friends, both of whom hope that technology will never replace people, and were quite annoyed they couldn't have a friendly conversation while waiting in line. Just another example of computers eliminating jobs they said, fearful of what our world will be like in five years. Think I'll always be pro-technology though, can't imagine where I would be today without a pc. (sad, but true)

WooWee, 3 Day Weekend.

More busy busy as a bee stuff around here... Went a perfect 5 for 5 on swimming this week, including today when I spent a good few hours teaching an old friend how to paddle like a doggie... Actually had a great time, one of the more fun filled days in quite a while. Had the usual frustrating first day when it comes to teaching someone how to swim (she's actually my 4th or 5th pupil) where they're not really willing to do anything at all for the first hour, and still run into various problems or fears along the way after that which tend to prevent much progress. Alas these things take time, and for some reason I'm willing to dedicate myself to helping someone learn a skill which will only be useful if they fall off a cruise ship, in most cases. Well, makes me feel better anyway. :)

After that we headed to Sushi Teri on Calle Real, for some good old fashioned food that involves a lot of me going "what the hell is this CHOMP oh hey its not bad, um, its WHAT?~!@??" and fiddling around with chopsticks trying to look less white (impossible). Really yummy though, i've always been a fan of most of that stuff. Maybe because I eat it so rarely, its like a treat. Who knows. Anyway...

Decided to go catch Black Hawk Down after that. Going to give it 6 M's, when it comes to war movies, its superb. For those pondering whether its something you want to see, my friend was outright bawling for literally 2/3 of the movie, including whenever anyone died, was shot, or there was any fighting going on, which is a LARGE portion. I'd rate it below Saving Private Ryan on the gruesome scale (especially SPR's opening scene, still dominant in my mind as the scene that affected me most) but there isn't much downtime, its just a whole lot of fighting. The fact that its based on a true story, and that it was only 5 years ago, not some far off generation we're not a part of, especially strikes home with a lot of viewers. I guess you could say its a SPR with the technology of the 90s. Amazing how much some of the scenes reminded me of Ghost Recon and Return to Castle Wolfenstein, especially the former, two games I've been playing a lot lately. Just a reminder that as real as they can make it on the computer, its nowhere near what its like to be there. Again though, its not a pleasant movie for the weak of heart, I'm sure it'll take a while for some of the scenes to stop echoing through the images my mind's subconscious creates.

On a more cheerful note, I did have a whale of a day, scheduled another lesson for tomorrow, so I better get some sleep. :) Not heading anywhere out of town this weekend, will probably just do a lot of catching up on movie and tv watching, oh, and sleeping of course. :)

Strange happenings...

One thing I forgot to mention from the last several days was that I needed to give a big congratulatory BOOYAH to Michelle Kwan for capturing yet ANOTHER national figure skating title. I've had the pleasure of watching her for several years now, ever since I found out one of the US's most dominant skaters was not only my age, but from my hometown of Torrance. Something about cheering for the home team and watching them succeed that makes me feel like jumping up and yelping with joy myself, even though I have nothing to do with it. :) Looking forward to seeing her performances in the Olympics this year, here's hoping she continues to perform to the same level of greatness that she has always managed to reach. You go, girl. The internet's a strange place these days, who knows, maybe this message will find its way around the world.

In other news, apparently there's someone wandering around who "looks exactly like me, except she's a girl" according to several people on my hall and downstairs... I've yet to see this, and find it hard to believe, but who knows, maybe I have a long lost sister or cousin or something out there someplace. :)

Won big last night in racquetball, but saw a guy playing on the next court in the other game at the same who was wiping the floor with his opponent, so should get more interesting as it goes along.

Whoops Where'd the Days Go...

So for once I've been busy, stuff to do, go figure... Been actually attending class which is always good, doing homework which is even better, and both my econ classes actually interest me, which is something that hasn't been the case in quite some time when it comes to other subjects...

Started swimming in the mornings, on MWF before my 11am class, on TR after my 9:30, that's gone pretty well so far. Did the towel membership thing where for 5 bucks you get a fresh clean towel every day that you just return to them to be washed, saves me a lot of laundry anyway... Pretty handy. Also joined intramural racquetball, first game tonight. I'm playing at the intermediate level which is the lower of two, but some of the guys at the meeting I'd played before and they were quite good, so I don't think it'll be a cakewalk for me. At the end of the season there's even seedings and a playoff system single elimination tournament, looking forward to seeing how well I do. :) If nothing else it will be getting me off my ass at least a few times a week to go get my ass kicked...

Ahhhhhhhhhh, Mmmmmmmmmmm

Back Massages. Coolest things ever. Well for the moment anyway. I'm not really into the hard grind your muscles dig your fingernails into tendons kind that a lot of people seem to enjoy for some reason (both receiving AND giving) but just being able to relax and relief stiffness is just eternal bliss for me. Hint hint to everyone who knows me who feels like doing me an incredibly wonderful favor. :) I like to think I'm decent at giving them too, the jury will have to let me know about that one though.

Was out driving yesterday and went past this big open field where I saw the most gigantic fire I've ever seen in my life... It was this humongous bonfire, the base of which was at least 20 meters across, reaching almost as high... Not sure what it was all about, but it was a pretty incredible sight. Made two U-turns just to get a couple more looks. :)

Saturday night, not much to do, early in the quarter so nothing I should be doing, and didn't have anything planned... This used to be the case just about every weekend for me, but lately I've actually had somewhat of a social calendar, its made me feel better about myself socially. :)

AWWWWWW ITS SO CUUUUUUUUUUTE!

A friend stopped by today with the cutest little dog I've ever seen in my life... This little tiny chihuahua with the big black eyes that just stare at you and seem to be continuously pouting. I'm petrified of dogs for the most part, largely because of an incident when I got the stuffing chomped out of me by this huge golden retriever when I was younger... But when they're so tiny, like literally 9 inches long, its tough to be scared. :) First week of classes is officially over... I FINALLY finished unpacking all my crap, I'd been living out of bags for a while... ;) Gonna go handle some paperwork and sign up for intramurals, more later.

Children at Play...

I'm not quite sure why the entertainment value of chatting with people using someone else's screenname on their computer is so high. People love to come in here and send random erotic messages to people on my list, luckily I have quite the distinctive chatting style and so its quite obvious when its not me at the keyboard. I've also been on the other side of the situation though, like last night when one of my friends send me a peculiar message which I took to be valid after initial skepticism... To make a long story short I lost faith in someone due to their lack of concern for someone else's feelings.

Actually mine weren't all that affected, having someone tell me they want to know if we can be "more than friends" has only happened a very, very, select few times and not in at least a few years so its not something I'm expecting at any point in the near future. I like to think I'm an optimist when it comes to things like waiting in lines and such, but I tend to be a "half-empty" type on other issues such as finding "the one."

Just finished playin some DDR in the UCen, I'm up to the level I can handle the "5 feet" songs the majority of the time... Not sure why I'm bragging.. HEY STOP MAKING FUN OF ME DAMNIT :( AND MICKEY SHIRTS ARE COOL OKAY...

Hehe.

Yawn...

More of the same today, random new classes where the teacher spends the first day reading the syllabus back to you in case English isn't your first language or something, and lots of threats about how not coming to class will directly influence your grade, etc etc etc.

I forgot to mention a side trip I made on the way up here to visit one of my old teammates from Academic Decathlon... Hadn't seen her for a while, we tend to meet up randomly from time to time to catch up. She's got her own place in West LA now, and is teaching dance while attending SMCC, was really impressed by the way things are going for her, she seems really happy. Course she did feel the need to mention I'd gained weight since high school (haven't we all) and I unfortunately couldn't fire back because she's just matured and is even better looking than before. What's lame, is the people who literally have the least to worry about, do the most worrying. Its like those people who whine about A-'s to someone who just got a C+ in the same class. Its just not one of the most tactful things to do. Gr. But yeah, went to a neat little italian place and had the biggest slice of apple pie I've ever seen (whoops) and managed to keep her laughing in my face for various reasons for a good portion of the day. Was hoping my headache would go away before I headed the rest of the way to Santa Barbara but alas it was not so. Nice seeing her again though, will probably swing by on my way through to judge the yearly Decathlon competition for the third time in about a month in Covina.

Dead tired tonight, think its just the fact that I'm on the tail end of this sickness and have been doing a lot more walking than I was during break...

Down, Down, Down...

An interesting day... First day of classes for the Winter quarter, had my Classics and Pstat lectures today, both look to be easy enough. Got to deal with more paperwork regarding the whole major switching thing, there was a snag somewhere.

Sigh, I feel like I'm trying to make small talk with myself when I'm not in the mood.

So I received news a couple hours ago that one of my friends who played indoor soccer with me last quarter and lived in the next building over died this morning. "Natural causes" is the official word from the coroner at this point, I'm pretty sure there will be more info on the 11 oclock news tonight. Been a while since there has been a death around me. Not the most cheerful of scenarios. I tend to be introverted about it though, visibly there isn't really any evidence. Not really sure why. A few short weeks ago I was complimenting him on a well struck shot. Just cements my belief that live is meant to be lived in the present. You just never know.

I R Heer.

I'm back at UCSB, and alive.... barely. Feel like absolute trash, nothing like getting high beamed for two hours when you have a headache, are going into coughing spasms every 5 minutes, and sneezing hard enough to worsen your headache every 10. More details later.