I am hangry. Food is give! GIVE!

I decided on a whim to move to WordPress. It just seems like a better site.

kyleschmelz.wordpress.com

I realize this is the way I start most of my posts, but...

So, it's been a while. Apparently my last post was in February - this may be a new record for me. I'm obviously not going to be able to relate every detail of what's been going on in my life since then, so let's skip ahead.

I'm done with my Junior year of college at Rose. I managed to increase my GPA in both of the last two quarters, which is good, but it's still not quite the 3.2 I want it to be. Overall, I've enjoyed my classes recently despite some pain in the ass projects. Hopefully that will keep up for my last year of college. Holy crap - only one more year. That's so weird to think about...

Next point - the economy sucks. Because of the economy, none of the companies in Indiana were hiring interns while I was looking there and even Rose-Hulman Ventures was lacking in the jobs. As a result, I ended up getting a job through a friend (thanks Stillman!) back home in San Antonio. It's a decent job and the pay is good, so I guess I can't really complain, but I was trying not to come home for the summer. The primary reason there is that I wanted to be with Carly this summer - we've been together for just over nine months now - but I also wanted to see what it's like to live on my own for a while. I've done college dorm and I've done international experience, but I'd like to try having my own apartment and what-not. Oh well. I guess I get to see what that's like in about a year.

As for Carly, she's doing research on campus this summer. Again, it sucks that we have to be so far away from each other, but one of the benefits of having a paycheck is that we can visit. In a couple weeks, she's flying down here to visit, and I think I'm gonna head up there later this summer, but I'm not sure about the timing.

I've learned rather recently how to do chain maille, which is both very tedious and a lot of fun. So far I've just done a few small patches with fairly light wire, but I should be getting a shipment of supplies on Wednesday. I hope to have something neat made by the end of the summer. I'll post pictures if anything comes of it.

Also, I'm going to try to get back in shape and lose some weight this summer. I've done some running on the treadmill in my garage and I think I'm going to set a few goals for myself. First, I'd like to lose at least 10 pounds this summer. I'm probably back up to about the most I've ever weighed and I'd prefer to be about 15-20 pounds lighter, but 10 sounds more manageable. I'm also going to try to run at least one cumulative marathon over the course of the summer. That's about 26.2 miles, so I should be able to achieve that one pretty easily if I keep running at least twice a week. I've gotten 3.1 miles so far, so I think I'm well on my way to that one. If I hit that early enough in the summer, I may push it to 50 miles or something.

Also, Texas is too hot. We've already broken 100 degrees a couple times this summer and that's only going to get worse. If we didn't have some way for me to run inside, I'd probably be content to sit inside all day.

Anyway, I should finish getting ready for work. See you later, blog.

So, it's been like 2.5 months since I've posted anything here. Sorry! As opposed to doing the big update/recap like I usually do, I'm just gonna post about what's on my mind right now.

First of all, it is balls cold outside. The wind chill was something like -25 earlier today and the actual temp dropped down to about -10 at some point last night. So, in their infinite wisdom, the school got a hot tub and put it outside today. In my infinite wisdom, I jumped on in. There was a bit of an incentive for me to do so in the form of Carly joining me, but it was still dumb. It felt great until I had to get out - there was ice all around it, so you had to move slow so as to avoid slipping, but if you didn't move quickly enough, your feet froze to the ground. My hands froze to the door handles going back inside. It was so damn cold. It was worth it, though. It was a lot of fun.

Led Zeppelin is awesome.

I'm afraid that I'm transitioning from someone who's attended a LARP or two to a LARPer. It scares me. Regardless of the social stigma, it's a fun activity so long as you don't get obsessive about it.

I know how to juggle.

Carly is awesome. Coming up on 4 months together in just a couple days.

Classes are easier than expected for this quarter, but next quarter will be much less relaxed.

I should get in bed soon.

It's not quite a full month since my last post, but it's pretty close. I should post more often. Whatever. I intend to use this post to talk about politics, so if you don't want to read me proselytizing at you, don't read it.

So, I grew up in the era of Bush the second. I learned about politics and government while under the reign of one of the worst presidents this country has ever seen, and through some dumb twist of fate, we had to put up with eight years of him. This was the first presidential election I was eligible to vote in, and I've been following it closely for over a year now. At the beginning of the general election, it seemed to me that we had a choice between a young man who had great hope and ideals and an old man who had a great deal of experience and the know-how to get things done. Though I had my preferences already, I thought either candidate would do a fine job. Throughout the election, though, their identities seemed to shift somehow. As time went on and as new facts came out, as new decisions were made, it became clear to me who the the correct answer was to the many problems plaguing this nation. John McCain's campaign grew more negative, more spiteful, and (starting August 29, 2008) just plain stupid. Barack Obama, on the other hand, proved to me and to the rest of the nation that despite a lack of experience, he had the right ideas and the right ideals along with the knowledge to carry out his plans. So by the time election day rolled around, we had a choice between four more years of senseless mismanagement of our government and four years of hope and change.

For the first time since I've been old enough to think about this sort of thing, I have hope for the future of this nation. For the first time, I am optimistic about the direction this nation is taking, and for the first time, I feel truly patriotic. In the past, America was seen as the greatest nation in the world. Not just biggest, not most powerful, but greatest. Over the last decade, that has changed. Many foreign countries now either fear us or merely put up with us because they aren't strong enough to fight our influence. When traveling to other countries, I have seen the absolute derision and scorn that many people have for both America and Americans. I now have hope, though, that this will start to change. Some day soon, we may begin to win back the "hearts and minds" of the rest of the world.

People talk as though the office of the President of the United States of America is the most important job in the world. Others say the president has no real power, and is merely a figurehead. While I don't fully agree with either extreme, it seems odd to me that anyone would say the president has no power. In the last century, the direction of the nation has been extremely dependent upon who held power in Washington. The effects of Roosevelt, Kennedy, Reagan, and many others can still be felt today. Unfortunately, the influence of George W will also be felt for many years to come. Barack Obama, though, has the power to lead this nation back to greatness.

Thusly, I made my choice. I sent in my ballot and I voted for Senator Barack Obama. While this was a very polarizing election, I am ecstatic to see that America agreed with me.

Grah!

It's been quite some time since I've posted on here.

As you probably all know by now, I'm back at Rose. Classes are in full swing and they're all going fairly well. I had an amazing first round of tests (high A's all around), but Rose has a bad habit of breaking things like that, so... I'll have to stay on top of my workload, but if I can do that, I may just be able to pull off some A's this quarter.

In more interesting news, I have a new girlfriend! Her name is Carly, she's a sophomore chemistry major, she speaks German, she's a lot of fun, she's very smart, and she's beautiful. We've been going out for a little under two weeks now. I was actually the one to make the first move this time - amazing how having been in a relationship gives you a little more confidence and understanding of how this whole thing works.

So, career fair round 1 is tomorrow. I don't have any classes or anything on Wednesdays, so I can just go down any time during the day... This marks the first career fair that I'll be going to with the intent of actually getting a job. Thusly, I spent the last hour and a half working on updating my resume. It looks much more professional and now includes more recent experiences, but I can't help but notice how hard it was for me to fill it in. I need more job experience and I need some more ME-related skills. This will come in time, though. After this year, I should have more stuff to fill it in with.

I still don't have my new guitar due to my funds being tied up in various manners, but I still want to buy a new one. By the way - turns out it's really easy to spend money without meaning to.

I've been staying up way too damn late lately. G'night, everybody.

So, the job wrapped up today. I was only working there for about 2.5 weeks, but I'm heading back to school on Tuesday, so today seemed like a good day for the last day. I had a really good time doing this job, I learned quite a bit, and my employers seem pleased with my work. All around, a great experience, not even including the money. I got my big-lump-sum paycheck today and I'm not sure what to do with it. I was working nearly 40-hour weeks at $10 an hour, so it's a good chunk of change.

My main plan is to spend at least half on a nice new guitar. By the way, if any of you readers happen to be guitar experts, I'd appreciate advice on which ones sound good for different purposes. For the rest of you, you can tell me which ones look cool and which color or finish would be best. I really would like advice on either front. Anyway, I've been saying for a while that I want a Gibson SG, but I'm not sure now if it would be the best fit. I'd prefer to get a really high-end one if I were to get an SG anyway, and I can't afford that. I checked out some guitars at a big music store in SA today and didn't find anything that really jumped off the wall and said, "BUY ME." I think I'm gonna wait until I hit the Haute to buy it anyway, as guitars are kinda bulky. After I buy the guitar, I'll probably pick up some accessories (distortion pedal, maybe a new amp, other tid-bits). However, even when that's done, I'm sure I'll have a good bit left over and that's where I'm not sure how I'll spend it. I think I'm just going to save the money for now and use it to buy things like Rock Band 2 and Star Wars: The Force Unleashed when they come out. Maybe I'll even find something practical to spend it on; you never know.

Making a quick post from work because the boss-man's not around and I've finished all I can for the moment. If I hadn't explained it before (too lazy to check old posts) I'm doing some 3D-modeling/drafting stuff for my friend Stillman (the aforementioned boss-man).

Anyway, all goes well with the job. I'm impressed with what I've been able to pull off over the course of the last couple weeks. Because this is such a tiny company, I can see quite directly how my work effects the place. They're apparently going to be using my drawings for a number of different purposes, but mostly marketing stuff and a little bit of manufacturing.

Also, all is well on the fitness front. I've lost about 13 pounds since the beginning of the summer, mostly due to Japan, and I'm now the skinniest I've been since freshman year. I'm now at about 167 pounds and I'm hoping to get down to 160. Also, despite the general lack of exercise lately, I'm apparently still in decent shape. Or, at least, I'm not in worse shape than I was at the end of the year. I was able to run about 1.5 miles last night at a decent rate and could have gone further if my legs weren't tired. I'm not worried about my legs being a little weak right now - that'll take no time to fix. It's the aerobic side of things that usually gives me trouble and has in the past kept me from running any more than about 1.5 miles without having to rest. I think I could've done 2 miles yesterday with good legs, but I might be overly optimistic.

I'm looking forward to getting back to Rose for a number of reasons. I think the main reason is that I want to see my friends, but I also want to get back to Rose for the school itself. I love that school and I can't completely explain why. It feels like home. Not to say that I don't feel at home when I'm back here in the SA, but Rose also feels like home. I would also like to get back to classes and what-not, and while I'm on the subject of fitness, the SRC would be really useful right now. I want to do stuff like some light weightlifting and racquetball and there aren't any gyms near my house that I'd be willing to pay for even if I had the money.

I should probably find something more productive to do, though. Later, faithful readers.

Hello again, faithful readers. So, new bits of news.

Time back in America is good. I miss certain aspects of Japan, but America definitely has its benefits.

I've somehow found a job to fill the rest of the summer. My friend Stillman is an ME still working on his bachelor's at UTSA, but he has an awesome job working for a tiny company just outside of San Antonio. He got me a job helping him out with 3-D modeling stuff and I'm making $10 an hour doing some fairly easy work.

My Hiroshima sunburn has finally faded.

I bought an awesome blazer at a thrift store for 99 cents. Yay!

I think I'm going back up to Indiana the last week of August. I'll probably move back in at Rose around the first of September.

Mein bruder is also gonna be living in Indiana this coming year or so. Hooray!

Okay, I guess I didn't have that much to say. Still, a post is a post.

Just a quick one - I'm back stateside. Happy birthday to me. As of now, though, I've been awake for about 36 hours and the vast majority of that was travel, so I'm gonna go lay down in my own bed and sleep for a long time.

I realize I never got around to talking about a lot of stuff from the last post. If we talk on the phone or meet up in person, I'll tell you all about it. As of now, the KIT IJST program is over and I'm enjoying my last week in Japan adventuring around the country. I don't have a lot of time to type this up because I'm sitting in an internet cafe in a big shopping area in Hiroshima.

So, the program ended. We finished up our classes, I got high grades because they were easy, etc. Turns out (much to my surprise) that I got the highest grade in class 2 for the exit test. I also got an award for having the best presentation for the Rube Goldberg device project. Turns out the president of KIT (!) thinks I talk good. After all that stuff got finished, we went as a group to Mount Fuji. Most people actually made it to the peak (starting from about 2400 meters up the mountain), but my group turned back at about 3000 meters. Two of us were underdressed, one guy was lazy, and one of our people was getting some pretty bad altitude sickness. I think I could have made it up, along with one of the other guys from this group, but for the good of everybody, we turned back. Turns out this was for the best, though, because it meant we actually got to the Kyoto hotel on time not to lose our rooms. We spent one day in Kyoto, where I spent the entire time sleeping. I literally only saw one city block and it was all taken up by the massive train station.

Yesterday, we went from Kyoto to Hiroshima, where we had a good ol' time exploring. Turns out, by the way, that just because a store is called "Net de Cafe" doesn't mean it is an internet cafe. No, in this case, it was a porn store. At best. It looked very sketchy. Anyway, we had fun yesterday. Today, we went to Miyajima, saw the famous temples there, took a "ropeway" (think skilift with enclosed cars) up a mountain, saw monkeys and deer everywhere, and walked over a kilometer through the rather slopy portions of said mountain. After going back down, we came back to Hiroshima, showered, sat down for a bit, and then went for dinner. This led to shopping and finding this internet cafe.

Since I don't have much time before I have to get back to my hotel, a few quick points must be made:
This keyboard sucks.
Japan is hot and humid in the summer.
Japanese internet cafes are amazing - I'm in an awesome little cubicle with a computer and a bean bag chair and as much manga as I want to read and free drinks...
Japan is expensive.

Goodnight, everybody.

Hello, faithful readers! I know this post is way overdue, so I can't talk about everything I've done over the last month that I've been in Japan. I think that instead of talking about specific events, I will instead talk about some things I've noticed in Japan.

First of all, there are the physical differences. The general stereotype of Japanese people is that they're very small and skinny. This is mostly true. However, I've read and heard from many people that even tall Americans don't stand out much in Japan. This is wrong. At 5'10" or so, I'm just above the American male's average height. In Japan, I'm probably in the top 10% of the nation. While the current college-age generation, the one I interact most with, is much taller than the previous generations (on average), they are still shorter overall. The tall people in Japan usually hit about 5'9" or so, very rarely going over 6 feet. Also, this is only the current generation. Old Japanese people are absolutely terrifying because they're all tiny and hunched over about 90 degrees all the time. It should be noted as well that this nation was not built by the current generation, but by its predecessors. As such, my height is almost identical to that of most doorways. Never before have I had to worry about hitting my head on the doorway, but that is a very real concern every time I enter or leave my room. While wandering through the Ninja-dera (which I'll get to later, because it was awesome), I had to constantly duck. This is all for someone slightly above average, mind you. Many of my friends here are over 6 feet tall and constantly stand tall over the crowd. As if being white wasn't enough to make you stand out...

On the subject of physical differences in Japan, there's also the weight. At a whopping 172 pounds, I'm pretty fat in Japan. I've actually lost a little bit of weight, but the majority of Japan is extremely skinny. There are hardly any truly fat people here. I've heard some various reasons for this, but the most reasonable one is the fast food factor. A Big Mac, fries, and Coke adds up to something like 1300 calories, but a typical Japanese meal consisting of a very large bowl of ramen, water or tea, Japanese pickles, rice, and maybe some kara-age (small pieces of fried chicken) is closer to 700 calories or something like that. It's ridiculous. That's really all I have to say on that subject.

Speaking of food, though, I have some complaints about this country and its treatment of American food. First of all, peanut butter is very hard to find here and costs about 3 times as much here as it does in America. I only recently got my hands on peanut butter and it cost me $5.00 just for a tiny 12 oz jar. Secondly, the pizza here is small, expensive, and weird. A while back, the people here wanted to do a beer-and-pizza party so as to have some American-tasting stuff. Instead, we paid about $16 for each medium pizza because the Pizza Hut here in Kanazawa does not have enough materials to make the number of larges that we want. I get the impression they do not have a large customer base. This Pizza Hut is also a KFC, which brings me to my next point: MASHED POTATOES. They don't exist here. KFC serves fries. I WANT SOME FRAGGIN' MASHED POTATOES FROM KFC. Day 1 when I get home, I am getting the KFC mashed potato bowl. That said, the chicken was pretty good. However, the biscuits have to ordered separately, they have donut-esque holes in the middle, and they're served with maple-honey syrup... Japanese McDonald's on the other hand, despite a slightly different menu, is actually as good if not better than American McDonald's. Maybe it's just because I hadn't had fries in a long time, but the first time I tried Japanese McDonald's, the fries were absolutely delicious. My theory is that it's because the Japanese actually care about their jobs, even if it is just McDonald's.

On a related note, the Japanese McDonald's serves some interesting things. They have various types of seafood in their menu including a weird shrimp-burger thing, but the important point is the Mega Mac. The Mega Mac is four hamburger patties, lettuce, pickles, special sauce, and I think onions. It is ginormous despite the small burger patties. The last time I went to McDonald's (I've only been twice since coming here), I got one without the lettuce and sauce. It was rather impressive.

Oh, and speaking of sizes of foods, the KFC meals are tiny. The chicken itself is smaller, first of all. Also, they have four-piece family meals. I strongly considered ordering one for myself, but I wasn't that hungry. One of my friends did that, and it was expensive, but he got what essentially equates to an American three-piece meal. I just got a two-piece meal and was still kinda hungry upon finishing it.

I'm not gonna get into the details, but Japanese barbecues are weird. Small, pre-cut pieces of meat, collaborative cooking, etc... It's fun, but it's not a real barbecue.

I've been doing a lot of biking courtesy of the communal bikes we have for this program. I definitely need to get a bike when I get back to Terre Haute. Riding a few miles to downtown Kanazawa, wandering around for an hour or so, and riding back is more fun than one would expect it to be.

Because I'm constantly surrounded here by people who either speak Japanese or are learning Japanese, I've begun throwing small bits of Japanese into my daily language. It's hard not to at this point, really. Sorry if you start hearing some weird words from me after I get home.

So, I guess that's it for my quick cultural observations and what-not. I guess I should talk about actual events and what-not now.

So, classes have been decent. Japanese language, which ends on Monday with a small presentation, has probably been the most useful class. It's been about 95% review for me, but we've reviewed a number of very important things. Japanese Science and Technology, which I think also ends soon, has been less useful. We received a huge vocabulary list every day for a while and generally wasted the whole class time. However, we recently did a presentation in there that was decently useful for learning how Japanese school presentations work, at least. Japanese culture is probably the least useful class, but that's due to a few students, not the teacher or the program itself.

The first few classes were Japanese geography and history, but after that we had a discussion one day in class about the differences in gender identity in Japan and America. This started because many people noted how much time guys here put into their appearance, citing it as girly. As such, we began discussing how we usually think of manliness or femininity and how we think the Japanese see it differently. This was going fine for a while, but eventually somebody we've dubbed the Bancho* started talking about how we're all horrible people for making crass generalizations and stereotyping. His buddy 5-O** then jumps in and starts talking about how he thinks it's bad to ever analyze people because then you see people as objects and you have horrible preconceived notions of what the people will be like instead of seeing them as the pretty, unique snowflakes that they are. Long story short, this argument continues for a while and everybody realized how obnoxious 5-O and the bancho really are. 5-O then sends the teacher of this class some long-ass email about how this class is wasting everybody's time, basically. He decided to speak on everybody's behalf... The gist of the letter is as follows: "I want to learn about Japan's culture and society, but I refuse to analyze its peoples. Blah blah blah whine whine blah blah." This wasted a full two-hour class as the teacher tried to determine if this was actually a commonly-held opinion or not. (The answer is no.) I don't remember what all he actually had to say during the class, but it was a waste of time, I can tell you that. Anyway, he's been less publicly useless lately, so we've managed to actually have some useful class time. It's great! Anyway, that turned into a bigger rant than it was originally intended to be, so I'll move on.

The project we have to do for this program is also progressing pretty well. If I didn't mention it before, the project consists of pairing up with a Japanese student and making a Rube Goldberg machine. It's gonna be pretty cool - my team's theme is Bruce Lee! Each team is actually 3 pairs of people with each pair being one American and one Japanese. My partner, by the way, is a very cute Japanese girl named Hiromi. She speaks very quietly and fairly quickly, so it took me a long time to get to the point where I could understand most of what she said. By the by, when I say cute, I do mean physically, but I also mean in her attitude and personality. Everything she does is very cute even though she's not the stereotyped tiny cute Japanese girl.

I'd like to continue writing, and I do have more to write about, but I'm falling asleep at the keyboard. I'll have to finish this later and post it when I'm done. Note to self - family visit, gifts, etc. G'night, all.

* Bancho means gang leader, basically. In this case, it's short for Bancho of the Dickface-tachi. Tachi is a word used to make something explicitly plural when you're referring to people. For example, watashi means I or me, but watashi-tachi means us or we.
** 5-O is the only student here from the University of Hawaii. Hawaii 5-O. He's either second-in-command or secret mastermind of the Dickface-tachi.

So, like I said, I'm in Kanazawa. Classes have started and two of the three involve at least some journal-writing, so I figured I'd pop onto LJ while I was in the mood for writing. I apologize for the length.

The last day in Tokyo and the train ride over were completely uneventful. However, upon arriving in Kanazawa station, we ran into a couple more Rose people and decided it would be a good idea to walk with all of our heavy luggage to KIT. This is a much longer walk than it looks like on the map, by the way. After walking for almost 90 minutes, we stopped at a convenience store (Sunkus) to grab some drinks. While we were waiting there, one of the KIT staff people drove by and stopped. She talked to Daniel, who's been to KIT twice before, and basically told him we were dumb for walking that far before driving him to the school in order to grab our keys. You see, the little detail we forget is that the check-in time ended just after we left the station - had we waited for the bus that night, there would have been people waiting at the school, but... Anyway, we got the keys after waiting another half hour for Daniel to get back and then walked the last 20 minutes or so to the school. Upon arrival, we all collapsed for a while before going to invade a local ramen shop or something like that - I forget where we went, but there were probably too many of us to really fit appropriately in that shop. Anyway, the rest of the people arrived that night and we all had a good time. Well, all but one person arrived that night - one guy had his flight rerouted through Seoul and delayed or something.

Anyway, the people from the other schools are all pretty cool. For that matter, all the people from Rose that I didn't know before are also pretty easy to get along with, some more than others. My roommate is also easy to get along with just because neither of us spend too much time in the room anyway. I'm here more often than he is, but not by much. My only real complaint about the room, outside of the uncomfortable futon, is the bug situation outside. Inside, the rooms are great. You take off your shoes at the door and from there it's all hardwood or tatami mats. It's pretty nifty. Anyway, we had a good bit of free time before we actually had to do anything for classes, but there were a few obligations before that. We had a placement test, both written and oral. I apparently didn't do as well as I thought on the written and I know I flubbed the oral due to nerves, but I still got into class 2, which is what I wanted. Class 1 is basic, class 2 is intermediate, class 3 is advanced. Class 2 will mostly be review for me, but that's really what I need at this point. Anyway, we also had the opening ceremony, which I was 15 minutes late for because a half dozen people told me to go to the wrong place. Because of this, I have a gash on the back of each ankle - running in crappy dress shoes you've never worn before that cut into your ankles is a bad idea. Stupid dress shoes. So anyway, that stuff was all on Thursday.

Friday was a free day except for the SGE (Students for Global Exchange) party that night. We all went down to the cafeteria and enjoyed some cold Japanese food while talking to the KIT students there. I accidentally ate some takoyaki, which is octopus meat. Not bad, but not good by any mean.s Good times and awkward, language-blocked conversation were had by all. After that, a bunch of us went out into the town seeking excitement in the form of a shiny building off in the distance. Early in our adventure out to this place, though, we ran into a group of the SGE students and we went with them to a karaoke place they know. It was a longer walk than expected and cost much more than expected, but food and drinks were free (including booze for those who were interested in such things). There was a huge catalogue* of English music available to choose from, by the way, and we ended up staying for about 4 hours. Some stuff we sang: Green Day, Foo Fighters, Queen, Ben Folds, Led Zeppelin, Gene Chandler, etc. Anyway, like I said, it was a lot of fun and well worth the money even though we had a very slow walk back due to some inebriation.

The next day, all of us went to the Hyakumangoku Matsuri, or million koku festival. Before talking about that, though, the ride there is worthy of its own story. Because we had over 40 people with the Japanese students included, we split into two groups. My group, Group A, took the first bus downtown - the bus was overfilled with just us, but more and more people kept climbing on to get to the festival at each stop. The bus-driver-lady kept sounding more and more exasperated at each stop and I was afraid she was going to snap if we didn't get off when we did. It was hilarious, though, the way you didn't need to understand a single word she said to understand her intent. Tack on the fact that many people didn't know how the Japanese bus works... We actually managed to delay Japanese public transportation! That's quite a feat. Anyway, we then checked out the beautiful Kenrokuen Gardens, saw Kanazawa castle, watched a parade, and saw the "royal procession" as actors marched/rode into the castle courtyard dressed as soldiers, samurai, and the royalty of old Kanazawa. We then spent some time checking out some food stalls down the street - I had some more yakitori and ate a chocolate-dipped banana from the chocolate tower stand - think big fondue tower. Deliciousness. It was then time to return to KIT, though. Due to the festivities, this was not easy to do. We crowded onto another bus after taking some side-streets in order to get away from the celebration and get back onto the main street. Fortunately, people were getting off of this bus instead of on, but it was still packed. I had to sit in Elliot's lap for part of the ride (well, I didn't have to, but it was either that or seriously crowd some girl that somehow ended up in the middle of our group), which is probably a big no-no in Japan. So yeah, that was a lot of fun.

On Sunday, I could have gone back to the matsuri, but I opted instead to hang out and, once bikes were available, go bicycling around town. The bikes we have available to us aren't very high-quality, but that seems to be the norm for Japan. Ours are a little rustier and older, but all of Japan's bikes, as far as I can tell, look like they come from the 1950's and rarely have more than three gear settings. The basket on the front is pretty useful, though. Let's fast-forward a bit, though, as I should be going to bed.

Monday morning saw the beginning of classes and the handing-out of our KIT laptops (Vista + Japanese + IE = bad). We had individual conferences with our language teachers, who told us what our weaknesses were, but didn't actually return the placement test. Mine went decently, I guess, but I could have done better on the test. We also had the first culture class that day, which looks like it will be remarkably easy. This is the only class taught by an American professor, by the way - all the rest are either KIT faculty or Japanese professors that teach at American colleges. Anyway, this all goes fairly well. After that, though, a few of the guys decided to take their bikes out to one of the mountains in the area and ride around. We didn't hear back from them for a long time, but they made sure to take bikes with lights in case they stayed out for a while. The reason they took so long, though, is because my friend and fellow DJ Matt (aka Spazz) crashed going down the mountain at about 20 miles per hour and scraped himself up something nasty. All the damage is superficial, but they took him to the hospital to check it out and make sure. He's fine now, but he has many sections of scraped or missing skin and a big lump on the right side of his face. Thankfully, Japanese health care seems to be really cheap. So yeah, I'm glad I opted out of that trip. Don't think I'll be biking up (or down) that mountain any time soon. On another note for Monday, though, we went to Hachiban (#8) Ramen for dinner. Turns out that the guy who runs the place speaks English, was completely self-taught through listening to radio and watching TV, and knows one of the Rose professors. We talked to him for a while before going back to the dorm for the night - real nice guy. We'll probably be going back despite the higher prices.

By the way, if anybody asks, Matt got those injuries fighting a bear, and you should see the bear.

Today was the first full day of classes. I woke up a little early, grabbed some food from the bakery down the street, and went to class. We reviewed some stuff, talked about the syllabus, etc, and then did self-introductions. Self-introductions are something I've been doing since very early in my Japanese-learning time, by the way, so today wasn't all that hard in the generic language class. After lunch, we had the first day of Japanese for Language and Technology. We got a big list of words for computer commands that we have to learn by Thursday and then stumbled through setting up the printer drivers with the professor who knows nothing about computers. It wouldn't have been a problem if the computers used a language I was fluent in... Anyway, tonight's been pretty mellow. I have all of my homework done. At dinner, we ended up getting some unexpected pastries at dinner. Eric was asking the waitress if she knew a place he could get something called taiyaki, which is a fish-shaped pancake-like cake with either custard or sweet bean-paste filling. I guess the chef heard them talking and offered to make us some if Eric was willing to pay a little bit - they didn't have the fish shape, but the custard one I had was pretty tasty. I'm not big on the bean-paste, so I passed that one down to somebody else. Anyway, I just thought that was pretty cool.

On another note, I've found some good used CD places in town and plan to do more shopping on the music front - so far, including Tokyo purchases, I have bought the following.

SOUL'd OUT - Selftitled (300 yen, used)
The Brilliant Green - Terra 2001 (300 yen, used)
Yamazaki Masayoshi - Domino (300 yen, used)
Hyde - Faith (1800 yen, new)
nobodyknows+ - 5 MC, 1 DJ (250 yen, used)
B'z - The Best Pleasure (250 yen, used)
Morning Musume - Fuyufuyu Morning Musume Mini (1200 yen, new, limited edition)


Well, that's that. I am now caught up on my LJ and can probably steal some topics (if not just copy-pasting full sections) for my English-language diary for culture class. I should probably get to bed now, though, because it is just past 1:00 AM here in Japan. Ja matta, everybody.

Edit - I forgot to mention pictures. I've taken a LOT of pictures. Here are about 200 of them. http://flickr.com/photos/27447816@N02/ They go in reverse chronological order, so start from the end.

*Spell-check is telling me that catalogue is spelled wrong, but the US is the only place where there's any other spelling. Even in the US, catalogue and catalog are both accepted commonly. This is dumb.

I'll post something more extensive later, but I'm here in Kanazawa. I take my placement test tomorrow and start classes on Monday. That's also when I get my KIT laptop.

Anyway, I'm alive and well. Whoo!

Heylo again. Looks like I might be posting more frequently while I'm here than back in the States. All of my group is getting ready for bed or is already asleep at the late, late hour of 10:15 PM, so I figured I'd run downstairs and use the internets. My email isn't working, so LJ seems to be the current source of entertainment.

Before I start, I apologize for my stream-of-consciousness style of writing. It doesn't tend to be laid out very well.

Anyway, today was fun. It rained all day, so I learned that every person in Japan carries an umbrella on a rainy day. All of them. The only two people without umbrellas today were either foreign or wearing a rain-blocking hat. Also, just about every store, no matter their usual sales, sells umbrellas on rainy days. It's almost kind creepy, especially when you see these tiny old women, about 4 feet tall, with umbrellas perched on top of their heads - they're like walking mushrooms!

So yeah, like I said, today was a lot of fun. We met up with Fumio (former guest in Casa de Highlord) at 10:00 AM outside the hostel and then went back to Akihabara. We explored a shop called Something-or-other Camera which was absolutely HUGEMONGOUS and full of things I couldn't afford. We then grabbed lunch - half the group went to makudonarudo (McDonald's), and my half went to an amazing little ramen shop. I got some sort of spicy chicken dish that was just awesome. After that, we went back to the bookstore we went to yesterday, where I picked up the CDs and what-not. I almost bought Ouendan 1 and then almost bought a real DS kanji dictionary to replace the thing that I thought was a kanji dictionary when I paid $35 for it... I decided they were both too expensive. I then went to check out the used CD rack - AWESOME. I bought one CD each for nobodyknows+, Soul'D Out, and B'z. (Brandon - they had each of the Morning Musume CDs up through 5 or 6 for ￥250. You already have them on your computer, though, and I don't have enough money.) I thought about getting more, but the selection was less good since it was the bargain rack.

Sono ato de (after that), we went to check out Akihabara's awesome arcades. At the first, Club Sega, Fumio and I rocked out on some Taiko Drum Master. I had never played before, but years of rhythm games made it pretty easy. There weren't really any other nifty games there, though, so we eventually left. While waiting on somebody for something, a couple of us then made a brief foray into the store next to the arcade. After seeing that the 7th floor held adult DVDs, curiousity led a few of us in the group to check it out. Nothing was purchased and nothing that creepy was seen. However, the floors preceding the 7th looked immensely creepy - bright pink everywhere with smelly-looking guys drooling over action figures and/or video games. *shudder* A very creepy ad for a very creepy DS game was showing on their TV when we got outside. Anyway, we then went to the next arcade over (Hirose Entertainment Yard - Hey) and played a number of other games. Despite the change machine stealing my 500 yen coin, it was still fun. DDR is fun everywhere.

Since I'm running out of time with internet access, I'm gonna cut the rest of the story short. We went to Asakusa, saw some very Japanese looking temples, looked at souvenirs, took pictures. Fumio returned home, said he'd email me soonish. We then returned to the hostel briefly before heading back out before dinner. If you ever go to Tokyo, go to the Yakitori & Bar on Edo-dori near Asakusabashi Station right next to the police box. AMAZING yakitori. The wing skewers were particularly excellent (I also tried tandori chicken skewers and chicken heart skewers), and what little of the booze I sampled from friends' glasses was actually kinda tasty. I've never said that about alcoholic drinks before - most of it tastes horrible. We then sat around watching How I Met Your Mother on Matt's laptop for a couple hours. What a great way to spend time in a foreign country, huh? Anyway, I gots to go. Later, everybody.

Hey, everybody.

I have made it safely to Japan! I am currently posting from the youth hostel I`m staying at in Tokyo. I won`t say too much because I want to rest after a long day of shopping in Akihabara and Shinjuku, but suffice it to say that I`m having fun so far.

A quick recap: The flight was uneventful. I managed to find an American ATM and money exchange place in the Tokyo airport in addition to the other 6 people I`m traveling with. We then took the subway to the place where we thought the hostel was. It took us two hours to find the hostel after getting off the subway. This was when everybody still had their baggage, mind you. Thankfully, I got a service at the airport to send my biggest suitcase along to KIT, so I just had a bulky backpack and a little dufflebag full of clothes. Dinner that night consisted of a pastry from the local 7-11 because I was too tired to eat. We all went to bed at about 9:30 PM (7:30 AM at home, after being awake over 40 hours) and woke up at about 6:00 AM. We went out into the city and had fun at that point. My wallet has grown less heavy over time, but not excessively so. I bought a kanji dictionary for my DS, a small case for my DS games, 4 manga collections (250 yen for one and 105 yen each for the other three - that`s essentially a dollar for each book!) and two CDs. I bought one Hyde CD and one Morning Musume CD. The latter is mostly for my brother, but I`ll be listening to it anyway.

Anyway, I`m going to try to find a way to make my email work so I can tell my parents I`m alive now. Just thought I`d post while I have access to the hostel`s internet - only 50 yen (about 50 cents) for half an hour is an amazing rate for internet. I might wake up early and hop on Skype tomorrow morning (about 4:00 or 5:00 PM in central time), but I don`t know if that`ll actually happen. G`bye for now.

I'm going to Japan in a couple days. I'm so excited I can't express it properly, so I'm not going to try.

In other news, I finished my sophomore year of college at Rose. I started one of those lists on what I'd accomplished this year, but those things never really work out for me. I always end up going off on a tangent or something, so I decided to scrap it. Long story short: I learned a number of things this year, but mostly I learned that I can actually make it both as a student and as a human being. I made it through some of the hardest classes I'll have to take with my GPA intact, so I think I can finish my time at Rose without too many complications. As for the human being part, I grew a lot this year. I made a number of new friends, lost some from last year, managed to stay sane, and even did the whole relationship thing. Unfortunately, though, my hair is short again. It has been since about, oh, December, I think, but that's one of those things that happened this year. I may grow it back out... I'm not sure. College is pretty much the last time I'll get to keep it long, so I think I will grow it back out.

Anyway, back to Japan. Like I said, I'm really looking forward to getting there, but I'm not even a little bit ready to go. I've done a couple of the preparatory things - I had my last American steak for two months tonight - but I haven't even started packing. I still need to buy a gift for my host family. A couple more days at home would be nice, but at the same time, I can't wait to get there. I'm heading out Saturday morning, arriving Sunday afternoon (damn time zones!), and then spending a few days in Tokyo with some friends. We don't have any major plans except to meet up with Fumio, the Aizu student who stayed with me while he was at Rose, so we should have fun exploring the place. On the 4th, we head out to Kanazawa. From there, I have six weeks of classes at KIT to look forward to, but I don't think the classes will be a big deal. More likely, I'll spend the time having fun in Japan and karaoke-ing the night away a lot of the time. After the six weeks of the actual KIT program are over, I'll bounce all around Japan having fun and exploring with some of the other guys from the trip. I come back to the States on my birthday - with my current flight plans, I get to sit in LAX for about 7 hours before flying back to San Antonio, but that may be changed. If it does get changed, I might go to a Cheap Trick/Journey/Heart concert the night I get back, but that may be a bit much for the end of a 37-hour birthday. Depends on how much I sleep on the plane and how much I feel like just collapsing when I get home. Also depends on whether or not my parents agree that concert tickets make awesome birthday presents.

And now for some unconnected bits of small news:

I will have so many movies to catch up on when I get back... This is a good summer for movies.

Rock Band can make many different experiences depending on who you play it with... Playing with one's family is very different from playing with one's college friends.

Wii Fit is nifty. So are Mario Kart Wii and Super Smash Brothers Brawl.

I am out of practice and out of shape for DDR.

Iron Man kicked serious ass. Go see it now.

I intend to lose a significant amount of weight this summer. By the end of Junior year, I'd like to be back down to about 160 or lower. That depends on how much is muscle, though, of course.

My DS and iPod will be grand sources of entertainment for the flight.

Just as a heads-up, I don't think I'll be on teh internets much while I'm in Japan. Most of my internet time will just be occasional Skype time - if you have Skype, send me your contact info! Anyway, that most likely means I won't be blogging much in Japan, but you never know. I might decide I hate the country and have to vent my anger through the internet or something. Doubtful, but you never know.

To say the last few days have been eventful would be an understatement.

First, there's been a lot of school-related hassle. Tests, projects, homework, etc. Seems like all of my classes have had something big going down lately. I don't even remember what's been happening on that front, though, so I'm not gonna try too hard to figure it out, if you guys don't mind. It's rather late.

On the brighter side of things, I am now a full-fledged DJ! My first show was yesterday and I think it went rather well, personally. You should listen in by going to wmhd.rose-hulman.edu and streaming the radio station via the links at the top. My show is "Embracing Mediocrity with Highlord and Spazz" - for those who don't know, I acquired the nickname 'Highlord' this year. My friend Matt, who should be joining me in DJ-ness soon, goes by Spazz once in a while. Thus is the show named. (By the way - I can explain the Highlord thing if anybody really wants to know.) Anyway, the show runs from 9:00 PM to 11:00 PM EST on WMHD 90.7 FM, aka The Monkey. I will play just about anything, especially if it's requested, so feel free to call in and/or IM some requests while I'm on. The central theme of the show will be classic rock, though.

In less bright news, Katie and I broke up on Thursday. I'm not going to get too specific, but it was a mutual decision, there wasn't a big argument or anything, and we're both trying to get back to a normal friendship even if that makes for some initial awkwardness. By keeping myself busy, I haven't had to think about it a whole lot, but it was really starting to get to me earlier tonight. Anyway, in the interests of my privacy and hers, I'm not really gonna say any more about that. If you want to know more, that's what phones are for.

So, Katie and I were going out for just over three months. This was the first real relationship I've ever been in, to be honest. It was really nice being that close to somebody and I find myself regretting that it came to an end, but I know it's for the best. I may reflect on that a bit more once the events are less fresh and perhaps more clear.

I might make another post soon to talk about other stuff, but I'm not really in a writing mood. I think I'm gonna go to bed.

Hello, everybody. I believe my readership has recently expanded a bit, so welcome to the new fellas and welcome back to the regulars! The readership is still probably small enough to be counted on two hands and maybe a foot, but whatever. One can dream.

Anyway, I guess I should find something to talk about now that I've started this post. There are a couple things I guess I could mention... Well, nothing huge has happened in the last week or so, so I guess I'll just talk about today. That way I'll have something posted, at least. It's obnoxious when I realize I haven't posted for over a month.

So today started at about 11:00. After waking up, I bummed around teh Blumbergs for a while, and then went to lunch with a bunch of the guys at the ARA. Ran into Katie, went to Percopo briefly, returned to Blum... I then took Matt to Guitar Center where we tried out a number of guitars and looked around before I eventually just bought some picks. They're yellow Dunlops, if anybody is really that curious. We saw some pretty awesome guitars, including an acoustic flying V. That one was just confusing. It had a decent tone, though, so I guess it works. Anyway, after that, I played racquetball with my RA and a couple friends. Lost the first two games, won the last one. Not too shabby. Let's see... Bummed around Blum, killed time on the internet, went to Little Caesar's and grabbed a pizza for dinner, and then went to do some DJ training.

I am going to become a DJ on my campus radio station (WMHD, The Monkey) with one of my friends (the aforementioned Matt who went with me to Guitar Center). In order to do that, we need to shadow a DJ, train under a DJ, record a PSA or promotion, and then do an on-air test before actually becoming a DJ. We have now done the first two. It was pretty interesting - when we shadowed, we sat in on Dr. Ferro's show. Dr. Ferro is an ME prof who has a show on the radio called The Metal Hour, in which he plays metal music and talks about metallurgy. The irony of a metallurgist named Ferro still amuses me greatly. Anyway, he was kinda sick when we did it, so he played several songs that were 9+ minutes long so he wouldn't have to talk too much. Nice guy, played a good bit of Pink Floyd. I can respect that. For the training, I sat in on Electric Eclectic, run by two members of the Roleplaying Club, Phil and Amani. Phil is the guy that I usurped the position of treasurer from. Anyway, their show was pretty cool. We learned how all the stuff worked, they had us play a song each so we knew how the CD player and the levels worked, and there were six people in the studio at one point. Phil and Amani running the show, me and Matt training, and Katie and Elliot just popping by. (By the way - Katie is also working on becoming a DJ.) That was a lot of fun. The song that I played was "the birdman" by Our Lady Peace, FYI. Matt opted instead for "Intergalactic" by the Beastie Boys.

So after that, I wandered back to Percopo with Katie, we talked for a bit over there, and then we came back to my place and watched Wild Zero. Wild Zero is a Japanese zombie movie featuring the band Guitar Wolf and a lot of Japanese rock and punk music. (Note - The band Guitar Wolf is made up of Guitar Wolf, Drum Wolf, and Bass Wolf.) Rather silly, but we both enjoyed it. It was manly and silly enough to make up for 27 Dresses. I then walked her back to Percopo (I seem to bounce back and forth between the halls a lot...) and came back to Blum. While we were there, though, a pair of drunk folks were yelling at me encouragingly to kiss Katie. I don't think they're aware that we've been going out for quite some time already - they may have been less excited by the prospect with that bit of knowledge. Oh well. Anyway, I then sat in the lobby messing with Carly (always a good time) and watching Torchwood for about two hours. That's a really good show, but I don't think I should get into it too much because then I would watch it all the time.

Alright. That's my day. Hit me up if you have any questions or if you just want to talk. Oh, and one last note - I have changed my theme. The last one was a little too much on the gloom and doom.

Again, I've been getting lazy about these posts. I guess I'm back down to once a month or so.

So what's happened since my last post? A lot of things can happen over the course of a month, especially at Rose. I got through my first round of tests - 80, 87, 89, and one still unknown. Not bad, but I'm trying to actually get some A's this time around, so I'm gonna try to kick those up a bit on the next round of tests.

I am on spring break right now! This is a week later than most people do spring break, but Rose is weird. We've been over that in previous posts. Anyway, this break has been rather different from the way I spend most of my breaks. As opposed to flying home for a week and flying back like I usually do, I decided to spend some time with friends. First, I went to see a Cheap Trick/Joan Jett concert with Katie and Ben, who are my current girlfriend and former roommate, respectively. That was pretty awesome - Joan Jett is very attractive for a woman her age (or a younger age, really), the Blackhearts are much more impressive a band than I expected, Cheap Trick is awesome, and Cheap Trick is awesome. Thought I'd reiterate that. Anyway, from there, Katie and I parted ways with Ben, who drove back to Rose. I took Katie home to Chicago and spent the weekend with her, which was absolutely amazing. I got a Chicago hot dog, explored downtown a bit, checked out the Chicago art institute, saw a crappy chick-flick, and most importantly spent a lot of time with Katie. Just those three or four days would have made for a good break, but I still have the rest of the week off.

This weekend, I'm going to another Nero LARP, so I'm spending the rest of my time at a friend's house. Brian lives near Cincinnati, so it was a bit of a drive to get here, but it wasn't horrible. So far at Brian's place I have done absolutely nothing but surf the 'net... I'm thinking I should have stayed a little longer with Katie, but oh well. Bearded Chris (so named for his impressive beard) is also staying here, and today we're making Brian actually leave his house. Hopefully. It would help if he'd actually wake up... Well, I guess he's awake now, but he's in the shower and Brian takes friggin' forever in the shower. I have a couple places I'd like to go, but more than anything else I'd prefer it if we didn't just sit around his house all day again. Comedy Central and Adult Swim only entertain for so long...

Oh well. Time to go do other things.

I had been doing a good job of updating this fairly frequently, but that seems to have fallen by the wayside lately.

Anyway, I don't have overly much to post about. (Edited upon completion of the post: boy, was I wrong!) Break was very enjoyable despite the fact that everybody was busy and it was hard getting in touch with people. Being home was an amazing refresher after last quarter's stress.

This quarter is going well so far. It shouldn't be quite so much work as last quarter and chemistry won't be such a pain now that I have a competent professor. I had heard less than good things about Mottel, but compared to McLean, he's a saint.

I've been doing more with guitaring lately and I think I've improved significantly in recent months. In addition to learning the Rain Song like I had mentioned in another recent post, I've been working on Over the Hills and Far Away by Led Zeppelin, Crazy on You by Heart, Roundabout by Yes, and a few other things. Hooray!

The biggest bit of news I have is that I'll have a roommate again for a short while. Well, this weekend has also been like having a roommate again because my former roommate, Dan, is visiting. He's thinking about coming back to Rose, which is awesome. Anyway, though, there are a couple students visiting from the University of Aizu in Japan and I'm hosting one of them while they're here, so I'll have a roommate for about 2.5 weeks. He arrives this Wednesday night. His name is Fumio Nakajima and he's a Junior CSSE or something like that.

In other news, I took over as Roleplaying Club Treasurer and Librarian this quarter. I've got the library organized and inventoried now (which was not done before) and hopefully some more people will start using it now. I've also been making up our budget proposal - this is made difficult because the rules are slightly unclear on what we're allowed to use the money for and we haven't had any formal budgets before - we're a fairly new club. Also, our previous treasurer was kinda useless. Nice guy, but didn't do anything. In addition to that stuff, I guess I'm supposed to attend some kind of summit this Thursday that will hopefully clear a few things up about the budget and how that works.

Oh, and speaking of Roleplaying Club business... Our officers are kinda strangely distributed. I'm treasurer, my girlfriend (Katie) is the president, and two of my friends, who are roommates, are the secretary and event manager. Next year, those two will be my suite-mates. Thusly, we will always have three officers around, and often four. As such, officer meetings are exceedingly frequent and it seems like we're almost always at officer quorom, which requires three of the officers about. Because of this, I have decided to use an officer hat. I am not to be considered an officer for the purposes of making quorum unless I am wearing my Superman hat.

Speaking of la presidente/Katie, she's amazing. It's been about 6 weeks now (although it doesn't seem like that long) and everything has been going great.

Also speaking of roleplaying, Gary Gygax died a few days ago. For those who don't know, Gary Gygax wrote the original Dungeons and Dragons books and practically invented roleplaying as we know it. It certainly wouldn't be what it was today if not for him. For someone like me, for which roleplaying is mostly just a different form of social recreation, this is still a pretty big deal, but I know that it means a lot more to other people and this had a pretty profound effect on the roleplaying community. In discussing this at the last roleplaying club meeting, we started discussing stories of how we all got started on roleplaying. Having initially gained interest in it somewhere around the age of 7 years old, I was one of the younger gamers there, but it helps that I have nerdy parents. Some people pass on dusty old watches and what-not as heirlooms... My dad gave my brother and me his old AD&D books and his dice bag. It's a really awesome dice bag, too, and I am jealous of Brandon for having it.

Jumping subjects completely, I have decided that Super Smash Bros. Brawl turns a lot of people into much more obnoxious versions of themselves. Brandon, this does not target you - even when you do your gaming in something less than proper moderation, it doesn't change the way you act. It's just the half-dozen or so people that sat in my dorm's lobby playing it until 9:00 AM the night it came out I'm referring to right now... Minor complaint, I guess. I have too many other games to worry about that one for the moment. I still need to start Assassin's Creed, Mass Effect, Super Mario Galaxy, and Nights. I got these all around Christmas time and last quarter just didn't give me much time to play any of them.

Also, we found out about housing stuff recently. Since I have two seniors in my group-of-four, I'm practically guaranteed a spot in the apartments - they go by seniority, and last year, each group that had at least one senior got in. The chances of me not getting in are astronomical. The aforementioned RP Club officers, Chris and Corvec, will be my suite-mates and both of them are seniors. Elliot, on the other hand, will be my roommate. Should be good times next year.

In other news, I need to find better segues. However, now that I'm done detailing past things and abstract things, I can talk about today. I woke up late, spent time with Dan, spent time with Katie (yay Katie time!), played Ultimate Frisbee (and scored the final point - whoo!), worked out at the gym for quite a while, and then made a dinner of breakfast items with a couple of the guys. Lesson 1 - Matt can't make bacon. Lesson 2 - Mitch can't make bacon. Matt started it badly and then left it to Mitch to finish. The end result of this is that we had very burnt bacon and a smoky haze in the lobby. I'm surprised we didn't get a smoke alarm. I made the next batch of bacon and did fairly well. It was slightly burnt, but the bacon was really thick at the edges and really thin in the middle. Add on the less-than-optimal conditions of our crappy communal kitchen, and it was harder than it should have been to make bacon and eggs. We're going to try this again once we actually have milk, better bacon, and a spatula. Scrambled eggs are rather small when you don't add milk at the beginning and it's hard to flip bacon with a wooden spoon. Anyway, it made a pretty decent, if unhealthy, dinner after the workout.

Everybody should listen to Jonathan Coulton and Melanie Horsnell. They both make awesome music, as far as I can tell. I haven't heard as much from Melanie Horsnell - just what she has posted on her MySpace site - but Jonathan Coulton has all of his music listenable and buyable on his website and I have yet to find a song I don't like on there. Particular gems - Re: Your Brains, Skullcrusher Mountain, Mr. Fancy Pants, W's Duty, Big Bad World One, Still Alive, and When You Go.

This post is muuuuuuch longer than it should have been. Sorry for the large bulk of text. I said I was going to bed over an hour ago. I'm gonna do that now.