"Debates" and college

I watched the first presidential debate last night between McCain and Obama. Disregarding the candidates’ actual positions on the issues, I was a pretty fed up with the format of the debate. It really represents the way the whole campaign process is run. The candidates have to dodge around the real substance of debate, which is telling the other person that they are wrong, and resort to this weird combination of sarcasm and feigned ignorance, using phrases like “I don’t think he understands” and “I don’t know about my opponent, but I…”, instead of saying “Your are incorrect. Your position on issue X is wrong because of reason Y. My position is correct because of reason Z”. This annoys me, because it short-changes the people watching the debates; we don’t get an accurate picture of who thinks what or who’s right and who’s wrong.
In other news, my college applications are coming along well. I have a friend coming over at one, who will be coming to the show tonight, but he is bringing a bunch of work he has to do as well, so we will not be hanging out as much as working in the same area. I am looking forward to the show tonight; it will be a good way to relax after a long day of monotonous work. There are some very interesting exhibits in the galleries as Mass MoCA right now as well, so we’ll be going a bit early to see them. One of them, by Jenny Holzer, is a huge darkened room filled with beanbag chairs. Poems are projected moving over the floor and walls from two projectors at either end. I saw this one before, but would like to see it again. There is also a back room to this exhibit that I neglected to see the first time.

…and still no end in sight

I am still slogging knee-deep through miles of college applications. I have completed the main section of the Common Application, and the first draft of my main essay, and I’m now beginning the rather repetitive process of filling out the various supplements. Seven out of the nine schools I am applying to through Common App have their own supplements. I just went through and filled out all of the biographical, multiple choice, and short-answer-type questions in the supplements, and now I’m starting the various essays. This is going to be a long process.
It seems to me that the supplement sort of defeats the purpose of the Common App. The whole point is the admission that all of the schools can use the same data and come to different conclusions if they wish to. The Common App simply exists to make it easier for students to submit applications, and the supplements work counter to that. At least they are not as long as the main application, but they are still inconvenient.

A brief reprieve

I am taking a break, having finished two of the seven supplements. I have not begun the Olin or Columbia applications, neither of which are part of the Common App.

Buckling down

This weekend is crunch time. I will be at home all day Saturday and Sunday working on college applications. I’ll be going out on Saturday night to see a show at Mass MoCA, but other than that there will be no distractions. My hope is to have all of my applications finished and ready to submit, and my recommendation request forms ready to turn in to teachers and the Guidance office, by the end of the weekend.
For now, though, I am ready to be done with what was a fulfilling, but exhausting, week.

NASA returns

I got another email back from NASA in response to my second letter.

Dear Harpo:

Thank you for your inquiry to NASA of September 15, 2008.

Under Federal regulation, NASA is authorized to accept technical proposals for evaluation only under one of two conditions: a proposal must either be (1) submitted in response to a formal competitive solicitation; or (2) presented as an unsolicited proposal. The procedure for submitting an unsolicited proposal is described in a NASA guidebook located at http://ec.msfc.nasa.gov/hq/library/unSol-Prop.html. The concept you describe is not structured as an unsolicited proposal as defined by the guidebook. Therefore, as submitted, it cannot be accepted for review. These rules are primarily intended to protect patent rights and copyright privileges of inventors.

Also, included in the above Web site are the respective NASA Centers and their particular technical areas of responsibility under the section entitled, NASA Research areas and addresses for submission. Perhaps you can address your questions directly to the respective NASA Center for an expedited response. After you review that information, should you continue to believe that your proposal would be more appropriately aligned with an area of research associated with a particular NASA Center, please forward a valid unsolicited proposal directly to that Center. You are strongly encouraged to follow the instructions as outlined in the Guidance for the Preparations and Submission of Unsolicited Proposals, Web site so that NASA Center personnel can process and fairly review your proposal.

NASA hopes that this information will be helpful to you as you pursue your goals.
Your interest in NASA and Americas space program is appreciated.

Sincerely,

Public Communications
Public Services and Protocol Division
Office of Public Affairs

I followed the link, and the page contains a lot of dense legal terminology and concepts, so it will take me a little while to parse it all and get this moving. I do intend to follow through and submit the theory. Further updates as I progress.

A good night for dreams

Both my sister and I had excellent dreams last night. In mine, I was at the Mock Trial state finals, which take place in Faneuil Hall in Boston, except that Faneuil hall was in Orange instead. We were facing Newton South (who we lost to in the finals last year), and the trial was just beginning. The judge made a comment about how pleased she (it was the judge from The Dark Knight) was to see so many spectators from both schools there. When she said this, everyone who was their from Newton South, parents, students, teachers, etc., stood up, and all started switching chairs continuously. Everyone was running around, and it was very loud and confusing. The judge seemed fine with it, so I stood up and objected, saying that their had been a gross infraction of the rules of conduct. I requested a few minutes for my co-counsel to gather themselves before we proceeded with the trial. The judge agreed, but instead of having a brief recess, for the next few minutes, people came up to the microphone and sang or played songs, like an open mic. I got fed up with it, and decided to leave. I left Faneuil Hall, and rollerbladed through Orange (I was wearing the black shorts I have with a paint stain on the fly [I had changed out of my suit pants because I was hot]) and my suit jacket. I rollerbladed down Route 2, into the center of Greenfield (which is not on Route 2), where I decided to turn around and go back. The only problem was that the way back was uphill a lot of the time, so it was going to take a while. Soon I came to a river. On the way there, I had parked in Greenfield, and walked the rest of the way, so I had swam across the river, but since I had rollerblades now, I couldn’t do that. I rollerbladed upriver, until I came to the bridge that connected Greenfield to Orange. It was the bridge that goes over the dam in the center of Shelburne Falls. I went over the bridge, back to the courthouse (the entrance to which was located in a very low concrete building, sort of like a fallout shelter. Going into the building, I met a classmate of mine, Jake Edwards, who in the dream was also on the Mock Trial team, although he isn’t in real life. We entered Faneuil Hall through the back door, and our coach, Gary, saw us, and told everyone we were back.
That is where my recollection ends. I have several theories about this dream. The fact that there are so many different geographic locations that were brought together tends to signify that I am doing way too many things (true) and that my focus is all over the place (also true). Jake Edwards is probably in the dream because he appeared on my street last night while I was walking the dog. Apparently he has a friend in number 18, the big brick house, who he was picking up. He didn’t know I lived there, either. Orange is probably in the dream because I drove there the other night to pick up my friends for the dance we went to. Mock Trial is there because, well, I think about it all the time, even though the season doesn’t start until November.
Koko’s dream involved a bunch of characters from various Joss Whedon shows. There were credits in her dream, and Joss Whedon was in them.

$squirrels=squirrels-1; //unfortunately

We hit a squirrel today on our way home from school. My father was driving, and there was no way he could have avoided it. Still, I felt bad that that squirrel wasn’t given the right to run where it wanted to run, even if where it wanted to run was across the road.

Pause

I’d like to take a moment of silence for the eleven victims of the Kauhajoki school shooting in Finland, including the gunman himself. He deserves our pity as much as our anger.
We should learn from this, as we should have learned from every other shooting and act of violent crime that came before. How many more innocents must become accidental and tragic martyrs for some unknown cause? Let there be an end to this. Let it be soon.

I return

I am on my way back to school. Hooray! After an excellent night’s sleep, I am feeling a whole lot better. I think sleep as a recovery method is underrated; it works very well.
Today I have an hour and a half long study first thing and an hour and forty five minute study last. My plan is to fill out all of my teacher and guidance recommendation firms, and get as much done on my actual application as possible. All hail the Common App!

Great timing

Google has just released their newest Maps feature: public transit directions for New York City. Thanks a lot, guys. Just a few days earlier and it would have made my life a lot easier. So it goes.

Worse and worse

I am home from school today; I was up all night coughing and the like. I am hoping this is the worst this thing will get. I thought the pertussis was on the run, but it seems that if you strike it down, it shall become more powerful than you can possibly imagine. Whatever the case, my cough has worsened significantly.
I think a slow day is probably a good thing anyway. I need a bit of time to catch up on college work, generally relax, and drink tea (although we are out of honey).

Back on the azithromycin gang

I went to the doctor earlier today, and I’m back on azithromycin. I’ve taken the first day’s two-pill medication, and now have four days of one pill each. Although I haven’t been contagious since I took it the first time, the hope is that this second round will help to knock out the symptoms, which are proving quite tenacious.

Exhaustion and IMAX

I had a long and arduous day, due in part to the fact that my pertussis is now compounded by terrible nasal congestion. I was glad to be home and back at school, and all of my friends were excited to hear my tales of The Dark Knight in IMAX. I did some research and found some rather fascinating info about IMAX projection. Apparently the projection units can way weigh almost two tons, and have a complicated compound lens system designed to be easily cleanable during projection. This is because if a little bit of gunk gets on the lens from the film, it will take up the entire screen because the magnification is so huge. The bulbs used in the projectors consume 15 kilowatts of power, and contain xenon at a pressure of 26 atmospheres. This is so high that when operators are servicing the machines they must wear protective body armor because if the bulb were to explode they could be seriously injured or killed.
Combining the most hardcore and awesome movie of recent memory with the most hardcore and awesome technical projection methods, you get the ultimate hardcore and awesome cinematic experience. And we had Milk Duds. Truly, life is good.

Waiting line

I am at Penn Station, waiting for my train to board. I printed my ticket using the self-service kiosks, with only a little trouble. The kiosks work fine, except that they require you to insert a credit cars to initialize the process, even if you’ve already payed online. After inserting the card, you are given the option of buying tickets or printing prepurchased tickets. In my case, this wasn’t a problem, because even though I didn’t buy the tickets with my own card, as it doesn’t work at point-of-sale (it’s just an ATM card, not a debit), I could still use it to get to the menu to print my ticket. However, if one had bought a ticket using someone else’s card because one didn’t have a card at all, they would be rendered unable to use the kiosks. I suppose that is what the ticket windows are for. All the same, it seems like a rather obvious, and easily fixed design flaw. You should only need a card if you need to pay.

Traffic control

The other train has passed, and we’re on the move again.

So much to say

I would have written sooner, but yesterday was so exciting that I couldn’t. Therefore, I will present a chronological narrative of what has transpired since I left Penn Station yesterday.
I arrived at the apartment easily, with a minimum of confusion on the subway. We hung around for a while, and eventually left to play Frisbee in Central Park. While playing, I noticed some people practicing a martial art, which I thought to be Aikido. Upon asking them, I learned that it was in fact the Butterfly form of Chinese Kung-Fu. We talked about martial arts for a while, and it somehow came up that I trained in Indonesian Kung-Fu. They asked me to do a demonstration, so I showed them two forms; a stationary form and the staff form. Then we left the park. We went to the 5:20 showing of The Dark Night. IN IMAX! I had already seen it twice, and it did not disappoint the third time. Especially when seen at 72′ x 53′. We picked up some pizza on the way home for dinner.
This morning we woke up at about 10:30, and left the house at about 11:00, walking towards Columbia University. We got breakfast at Nussbaum & Wu, which was the ultimate culture clash experience. There were Asian workers, salsa music blaring, and the best pastrami (the only pastrami) I’ve had in a while. We briefly walked through the Columbia campus on the main lawn, before dropping off my friend at the subway, as her bus left at 1:00. We walked back towards the apartment, and I stopped to get a cinnamon Danish (amazing) at the Hungarian Pastry Shop (recommended to me by my mother, and pointed out to me by the friend I was staying with). We sat at the Sip, a tiny cafe and bar that is open 10AM-4AM every day, and has table and counter tops made of pennies. I reserved my train ticket on my friend’s laptop, and walked down to Broadway to get cash (I used her credit card to make the reservation). I said goodbye to her when I got back, and walked off to Central Park, intending to meet the martial artists again, as I recalled them saying they’d be in the same place the next day at 1:00, but when I arrived, they were nowhere to be found. So now I am sitting under a tree, finishing my Danish, and waiting to leave for my train. I am taking the C train from 110th St. to 34th St., where I can get to the Amtrak station underground. My train leaves at 4:30, so I will leave here at about 3:30, to leave time for an approximately half-hour long train ride, retrieving my ticket once I arrive, and boarding the train. This gives me another hour-and-three-quarters, in which I will probably just relax, and observe.
At the moment, there is a children’s storyteller with a PA and a banjo telling a story to a group of children and parents. I think the story concerns many animals in a pit, hiding from what they believe to be the end of the world.
There is a lot to see here, so I’m looking forward to having such a large block of time to see it.

So close

We should be in Springfield in about twenty minutes. The train was supposed to arrive at 8:25, but that is clearly not going to happen. What with the drive and everything, I probably won’t be home until at least 9:15. And then comes homework.

Shut up and drive

I am off the train and beginning the drive home.

Rabbit update

Upon inquiry, I am informed that the rabbits’ names are Lexi and Spring. Lexi is apparently the more friendly of the two. Spring was actively engaged in doing just that; she was bouncing around all over the place.

Movin' out

I am picking up, heading out of Centeal Park, and going to the subway. So long, jump ropes and rabbits.