Qualifying update #3

Monday morning, approximately 3:15 am. It is finished. Sort of. Still need to proofread one last time and send off, but no new significant amount of information is coming, for better or for worse. Mental state: surprisingly chipper. Caffeine and sugar intake this evening has been much more evenly distributed. Peaks and valleys are all well and good when one is crossing the rugged terrain of the Oregon Territory; not so much for blood sugar.

At this point, approximately 39 hours used; 9 remain. Even allowing another half an hour to proofread and send it in, and eight hours (ha!) for sleep if that were really the physiological necessity everyone claims it is, I would just like to note that this still leaves me a full half an hour of buffer time. A.k.a. more buffer time than I have had for any assignment I have ever been given in my entire life. There must be something wrong with me. I must have gotten weirdly responsible in my old age. Or, more likely, screwed something up. Something like hearing "you only have to answer three of the questions," when in reality the assignment was "answer all eight, or you will be summarily castrated."

Pace: still steady. Rations: adequate. (Tomorrow and for several days thereafter, rations are going to have to become meager, as I am beginning to have trouble carrying my own fat ass back to the wagon, much less all the bison I am shooting.)

Sucked the snake venom out of Jane's wound; she is improving. Billy's typhoid took a sudden turn for the worse; he died. Also, Jane is pregnant. Apparently venom-sucking proved to be an unexpected aphrodesiac.

Until I find out tomorrow that I did everything OK, Matt has a case of Schroedinger's Testicles.

Qualifying still blows. For about 2.5 more days. At which point, qualifying will be awesome, since I will be done with it and most of my friends will still have to do it. Ha. Losers. Then, it will be paper revisions and conference preparations which will blow.

Qualifying update #2

Sunday morning, approximately 2:30 am. The night is still, as are my thoughts. Second question of 3 is about 60% completed. Nonlinear properties of visual system neurons have been partially characterized. 14 hours used, 34 hours remain. Mental state: sleepy. Will soon retire for the evening.

Taco Bell was an excellent choice. As was breaking during Taco Bell consumption to watch episodes of Family Guy ("You have AIDS" song was prominently featured in tonight's selection). Pace: steady. Rations: filling. Heath: Good, but fat. May have a tough time floating the wagon across the next river if I continue eating at this pace. Billy's typhoid is improving. However, Jane got a snake bite.

Random trivia fact of the moment: The guy who plays Creed on the American version of The Office was once a member of the rock band The Grass Roots. Singers of oldie classics like "Midnight Confessions," "Temptation Eyes," and "Sooner or Later."

Random trivia fact of the moment immediately following that one: The theme song of the American version of The Office is my current ringtone.

Qualifying still blows, though I can almost see the beginning of the end in sight. If I squint. A lot.

Qualifying update #1

Saturday, approximately 8:15 pm. First question of 3 (mostly) completed. 8 hours used, 40 hours remain. Blood levels of sugar and caffeine running high. Mental state: twitchy, but coherent. Billy has typhoid. A thief came in the night and stole 2 of my oxen.

The next question after this one will be harder to answer; the last question should be easiest. Must pace myself (current pace: strenuous, but not grueling). Time for Taco Bell break as I plan my next move.

Qualifying still blows.

I wandered lonely as a cloud, y0.

Hey Erica, how come your New Haven promotional video didn't look like this?

Also, a good story about copyright, fair use, and Green Eggs and Ham, from Salon. (Sadly, no reference to fruvous, though.)

Finally, who wants to see Buster Bluth in a Switchfoot video? Well, not me, really, but it turned out surprisingly well.

Qualifying bloooooooows

That's really all I wanted to say

from the friend who brought us alanis and her humps

nelly or grrrl rocker? you decide. (check out the first track.)

well, shoot.

turns out handel's "messiah" isn't so much "yay jebus" as "boo jews." even the guy who wrote "amazing grace" (about whom a movie proclaiming his awesomeness was just released) was in on it. yeesh.

...uh, happy easter?

alanis morissette's...lovely lady lumps?

hee.



edited to add: here's the original song/video, just in case any of us (*nudge* hi, dani!) miss the reference :-P

also, can I just point out (again) that this is a HORRENDOUS song? thank you, alanis (and india, and terror, and disillusionment) for continuing to poke fun at it.

eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee

eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee

july = so soon!

YouTube Award results

Sooooo... mixed feelings on the outcome of the first ever YouTube award results. OK Go won for Most Creative, which was deserved, methinks. I was not thrilled by most of the winners for the other categories, though. But, the winner for Best Series, "Ask a Ninja," is pretty funny. First episode below.



The winner for Most Inspirational was OK too... it was a neat idea, at least.



Finally, to complete the YouTube trifecta, this wasn't a winner of anything, but I found it recently and it amused me:

YouTube awards

Just thought I'd post the link so you can check out the nominees (and, as of Friday [I think], the winners):

http://www.youtube.com/ytawards

I haven't looked at everything yet... but I was not that blown away by the entries I've looked at so far in the comedy category (though "Ben takes a photo of himself everyday" is pretty decent if you get the reference of the parody). Several old standbys are there, including the Chad Vader videos and of course the original OK Go treadmill video.

On the one hand, I have to say that, with how incredibly easy it is to make cool movies on a Mac these days, I'm a little disappointed that all of the entries aren't spectacular. On the other hand, this gives me hope that I could do at least as well as these people. If only I had a little more spare time....

more OK Go-related awesomeness

I heard a passing reference to this online

but was underwhelmed, so when this



came up as a "related" video, I thought I'd check it out.

my faith in today's youth has been (mostly) restored. but how on earth did they get the gym teacher to let them rearrange the treadmills?

it's oh so quiet

so I was trying to find ways to waste time so I could look up at 4:30 and say, "hey! it's time to leave for st. patrick's day festivities!" and I decided to see when exactly we started this blog. for the record, our blogiversary is april 23 (mark your calendars!), and for an additional part of the record, we were WAY more prolific in our early days. what happened? not much has changed since last april -- we're all still students, and matt may have some qualifying thingy to worry about this year, but he didn't let something small like a neuroanatomy final get in the way of his blogging last spring so I see no reason to cut him some slack now. I will do whatever it takes to restore our early levels of irreverance and lively debate, but I need your help!

here's your first topic. wedding cake festooned with twinkies: awesome or hideous?

I am way on the side of awesome: chocolate frosting (hopefully surrounding chocolate cake) -- good! happy little decorations which will probably last longer than the marriage -- even better! what do you guys think?

By the way...

... I just wanted you all to know that, over the weekend, at extreme peril to my chances of passing my qualifying exam, I finished Harry Potter book 6, thus bringing me fully up to speed. And at some point, I think a full conversation is in order regarding what we think is going to happen in book 7. I have read much speculation on the Intarwebs, and have some of my own as well.

I will not begin this conversation quite yet because I still have reading to finish for tomorrow. But soon. Very soon.

PS: I am too cheap to actually buy the book this summer, but I call first dibs on borrowing it from whomever finishes it first.

I'm in song love

I stumbled across this song in a totally unrelated podcast about an hour ago, and between replaying it in the podcast, looking for videos of it on youtube and finally downloading the mp3, I've heard it at least ten times since then...and I don't see myself stopping anytime soon. so yeah, in true me style, it's taken me months to realize that a musician who was recommended to me (by you, matt?) is truly awesome, and now I'm seriously considering canceling my existing plans for march 30 so I can go see him (with paul and storm!) in NYC. who wants to join? (^k^, don't you need to look for apartments/drink at mory's sometime this spring? hm...)

the object of my obsession:

c'mon c'mon

have we all seen this?



My verdict? AWESOME.

either the world keeps getting funnier or my standards are lower than I thought

neuroscientists rock out

*snort* oh, I tried so hard to say that with a straight face.

this is fairly amusing, too

it doesn't beat a hilarious almost-war, but it's still worth checking out...

only in europe

I am highly amused.

swiss accidentally almost start itty-bitty war

Chad Vader, Day Shift Manager

If you think this one is funny, there are 5 more episodes... I spent half an hour today watching them when I probably had better things to do.