saturday, june 10

•••    the incredible machine is one of my favorite computer games. it's awesome. if only it existed in real life, it would be the best physics toy ever.
11:04 PM +

•••    sometimes I think I would rather be oblivious than truly self aware.
7:13 PM +

•••    I never thought I would have to deal with a security guard hitting on me. but life is full of surprises, and today I did. I wanted to smack the guy, but I'm a pacifist, so I just gave him a disparaging look. :P jeez.
6:22 PM +

•••    I finally got my act together and visited vegpledge. plant based diet saves the earth! hehe! doesn't that sound like it belongs on a comic book cover?
11:40 AM +

•••    one of the referring urls in my stats tonight was a google search for rabi whitaker. while I found that a little odd, I was curious, so I clicked on it - and look what I found: my name on a microchip. I think I can thank the planetary society for this one, because I know I never actually submitted my name to nasa. it's kind of cool nonetheless. I'm a space cadet in spirit. ;)
12:05 AM +

friday, june 9

•••    I do my best to avoid flame wars. maybe I'm a bliss ninny.
6:01 PM +

•••    raza got me thinking about nicknames. I wonder what counts as trivial? I've never really had a nickname (unless you count kaz, but that's just an avatar) that wasn't part of my real name. some of my more creative tormenters in sixth grade tried to call me ribbit, but it didn't catch on. I have to say that I think it's a much sadder state of affairs when someone is actually named something like candi or bubbles (I've known both) than when they just have self-appointed saccharine-cutesy monikers.

I hope that doesn't sound too judgmental. but really, bubbles?

as for shortened names, I like mine halfway shortened. my first name in all its long and ethnically incongruous entirety is audrey rabi. I dropped the audrey half when I was six; only a very few people are still allowed to call me audie rabi. as far as the college registrar and the irs and the state of massachusetts are concerned, it doesn't even exist. I'm just rabi. but call me "rob" and I'll be very unhappy.
5:34 PM +

•••    remember this? and this and this and this and this?

well, I just got my transcript, and I PASSED LINEAR ALGEBRA.

(I also set a new record for my lowest grade ever, but at this point I could not care less. and I'd like to point out that I must have learned a lot and done a pretty damn good job on that final to have passed the course after I got three points - yes, three points - on an exam that counted for thirty percent of my grade.)
4:27 PM +

•••    the cat just coughed up a hairball in the middle of the floor. I went to get something to clean it up. came back and found my cds all over the floor, my stereo decorated with half an inch of potting soil, and my aloe plant stuck behind the heating vent, sliced in two and bleeding aloe goo all over the place.
it's one of those days. dumbass cat. I wish I could just go back to bed.
1:59 PM +

•••    I am so tired.
I guess that's what happens when you go to sleep at 4 and get up at 5:40. bleah.
12:05 PM +

thursday, june 8

•••    I like art.
11:13 PM +

•••    enjoy the power and beauty of the force.
fabulous is how you look - fat as jabba the hutt you are not.
worry not about the dark side - worrying is as effective as trying to stick c3p0 together with bubble gum.
do one thing every day that would scare even darth maul! yesssss.
dance, even if you have nowhere to do it but your own swamp on degobah.
::giggle::
10:48 PM +

•••    I love how there are so many weblogs now that the "updated" tab on blogger's main page can have one time stamp with the ten most recently updated blogs having all been posted to in the last minute. remember when a three minute interval was a big deal, and a two minute interval was better than a four leaf clover? it takes me such a long time to surf the new blogs these days! but it's a good thing, it is.
9:36 PM +

•••    our cat (the nice one, not the psychotic one) is being a terror today. he keeps coming into my room, stepping on my cd player so that it stops and opens, jumping on my windowsill and knocking all my plants over. my aloe has endured a lot. I am not going to watch it meet its demise at the hands of a feline! :P
9:31 PM +

•••    any outing that costs me fifteen dollars is not a bargain, matinee or otherwise. it was worth it though. the opening sequence was gorgeous.
5:32 PM +

•••    my little brother and I are going to see dinosaur today. I am going to turn my brain off, not worry about the bad science or the flimsy plot, and enjoy the eye candy. oh yes.
2:07 PM +

•••    she didn't quit, she just moved. yay. :)
1:40 PM +

•••    wow, it's a good day for astronomy. I just got this link in the mail from my astro professor (we did a lot of astrobiology and extreme-environment-life stuff last fall). it has a good title too. ;)
11:55 AM +

•••    this is a great headline: scientists detect major solar storm, issue warning for earth. I can just picture the whole planet wrapping itself up in some protective sungear and scrunching down into its orbit to wait out the storm. :D
11:47 AM +

•••    this is a beautiful thing to see first thing upon opening ie. yay.
11:42 AM +

wednesday, june 7

•••    I'm with rick - why would I ever want to grow up? :)

when I was little though, and for a very long time, I wanted to be a writer. I used to write a lot. I started when I was two. now I have binders full of my typewritten, crayon-illustrated stories from the 1983-85 era. most of them, I am embarrassed to admit, involved mice and lego people getting flushed down toilets or trapped under typewriter keys. I also had a whole series involving zeno the whale, who was always getting into trouble and accidentally squishing people in their beds. I do still write, but not in such an organized way. I don't deal much in plots and intrigue anymore. ;)

for a year, when I was twelve, I suddenly decided I wanted to be an ornithologist. I think this came more out of my sudden blossoming interest in science, and my inability to figure out where to direct it, than any serious interest in birds. I have a pet lovebird, and he's a lot of fun, but I don't know what I would do with myself if all I did was study birds. even cool birds like quetzals and african greys.

in eighth grade, I did a combined math and english project on astronomy, fell in love, and decided I wanted to be an astrophysicist. now my master plan involves majoring in astro and minoring in english, getting a phd, discovering a wormhole (or trying to), and writing science fiction.

I will not, however, grow up. at least, not on purpose. ;)
11:42 PM +

•••    I am one hundred percent against censorship in the music industry, but I flipped out when I heard my eight-year-old brother singing parts of eminem's "the real slim shady." why? exhibit one.
9:37 PM +

•••    I was going to write an email in response to this, but I couldn't find an email link or anything (maybe I am just dumb). so, I am just going to publicly state that I claim no rights to this design, except for this particular picture, since I took it. there are too many blogs to get bent out of shape over similarity. besides, laura, maybe you will have more success with netscape than I'm having. ;) anyway, based on past experience, I'm sure whatever you come up with will look good.
6:56 PM +

•••    it's reunion week at harvard, and commencement is tomorrow. cambridge is full of white-and-yellow striped tents, folding chairs, photographers on a futile search for something interesting despite this being just one more in three-and-a-half centuries' worth of harvard commencements, and gaggles of middle-aged overdressed adults trying desperately to impress one another. if ever there was a case against ivy league education, this is it.
6:17 PM +

•••    black holes grow during their lifetimes... wouldn't that be something to see in time-lapse motion? :) remember when black holes were just one of those theoretical possibilities? now we've detected more than thirty of them. I still have hope for the wormholes.
11:38 AM +

tuesday, june 6

•••    we're all hot. hell yeah. derek rocks.
11:14 PM +

•••    pet rocks are widely ridiculed nowadays, but I think rocks have true therapeutic value. I have two special rocks. one I found on a harbor island several years ago. it's light and dark grey, wedge shaped, and striped. honestly striped. I call it my zebra rock. it lives on my bookshelf.

the other rock is oval, mottled white, and perfectly smooth. it would be a perfect skipping stone, except that then it would be lost underwater somewhere. it fits perfectly in my palm and in the circle made by my thumb and forefinger. a friend gave it to me last fall when I was upset about something, and I started carrying it around with me as a sort of comfort object. I kept it in my pocket, and it would pick up my body heat and become a little piece of warmth that I could hold in my hands. I still take it places with me, and when I'm upset or lonely or whatever I roll it around between my fingers, and it helps.

so. no rock is worth $3.95, even if it does come in a little box with an instruction manual, but some rocks are priceless in their own way. and yes, I am a sentimental freak, in my own way. :)
5:48 PM +

•••    a cold icky rainy day separates the people who can play for four hours straight from the people who just think they can. it's harder than it sounds. I'm worn out.
4:39 PM +

•••    I think blogger should change its name so we can all be powered by black hole.
12:24 PM +

•••    hey, cool! look who has his own domain now! bloggerized, even. so does this mean I have to read two pages to get my daily guanyao fix?
2:13 AM +

•••    I think frisbee has moved way beyond fad status by now. the national ultimate competition is pretty intense. and it's certainly not a bad fad!
1:28 AM +

monday, june 5

•••    I know she said she wasn't linkslutting, but alison made me blush, fiercely, and I need to tell the world about it. (or at least the little fraction of the web that pays attention to me.)
also, I love her date headers.
11:06 PM +

•••    my high school graduation was less than a year ago, so I remember quite a bit about it. some things, however, are more important than others.

I didn't iron my gown, but I did wear a dress. without a bra. it was hot in the field house, and they packed so many people into it that it was officially a fire hazard (not to mention illegal). I also brought a change of clothes so that I could get out of my dress as fast as possible. (this proved to be a disappointment to several people.)

I sat next to a girl whom I had never met or even heard of before. she babbled at me all through the rehearsals, and I think she would have talked to me during the actual ceremony, but I told her I wanted to listen to the speeches. the faculty person in charge of supervising and approving the student speeches had informed all the speakers to keep them short and sweet, because no one except their parents would be listening anyway. I was friends with the class president and the valedictorian, and I didn't care if anyone thought it was geeky of me to pay attention to the speakers.

I don't remember what the keynote speaker talked about. he was some harvard law professor. no one cared. I do remember some of the keynote speakers from earlier years (I actually had better seats in the three previous years when I was there with the orchestra than I did at my own graduation) - I remember one of them talked about how his father, misunderstanding the word "jacket," bought him a windbreaker for his first day at private school when what he really needed was a blazer. that was for the class of 1998.

when we lined up for the processional, I got a long-stemmed carnation and a little handheld fan on a string from my housemaster. while I was sitting waiting for all the people I didn't know (it was a big school) to cross the stage, I took out the fan, stuck its blades into the head of the carnation, and turned it on. the air was full of soft red confetti.

right before I climbed the stairs to get my diploma, my biology teacher ran out and handed me a set of lab goggles as a keepsake. my ap class had a grant from harvard, so we got to special-order real lab goggles instead of using those awful clunky things with the elastic straps. I had special small ones, because the bridge of my nose was too tiny to keep normal-sized goggles up. they were framed in bright blue. I took my diploma in the same hand that still had the goggles, so I could shake hands with the mayor. then I put them on as I crossed the stage.

the superintendant sang "celebration" at the very end of the ceremony, with the help of our music department staff, with the word "graduation" substituted in. it was a surprise, and I was one of three students who knew about it. and honestly, it was pretty damn cool. everyone said the class of 99 had the best graduation the school had seen in years.

my best friend and I went to see the phantom menace afterwards. both of us had seen it before, but never together. I was hyper. it was great. we were at a 10:15 showing, but the theater was almost completely empty, so I whispered sarcastic comments in her ear through the whole movie and excitedly pointed out the e.t.'s in the parliament chamber. we stayed until the very end to listen for vader breathing. I still have the ticket stub hanging on my bulletin board behind me: loews cineplex thu 6/17/99 presenting star wars I - phan.

I didn't want to go to my graduation. I thought it was silly and unnecessarily ritualistic, just like the prom and the senior awards ceremony, both of which I had skipped out on. but in the end, I was glad I had gone, and glad I was done. I still am.
9:16 PM +

•••    what is past is also sometimes future.
8:19 PM +

•••    my blood pressure is 92/38. according to the nurse, that's normal for a nine-year-old. (I spent three hours at the hospital today - it was a rheumatology day. I have the nicest rheumatologist in the universe.)
5:27 PM +

•••    check out the new pictures of mercury! doesn't the top one look like half a face?
12:03 PM +

•••    happy moving day, keith. I hope everything is going well. and welcome to the east coast!
3:11 AM +

•••    narcissism sucks too, but sometimes it is necessary: more on writing, online and off.
2:39 AM +

•••    web journals suck. weblogs suck (oh come on, I don't have to link this one, do I?) whatever shall we do?
I'll tell you what really sucks. sarcasm. :)
1:57 AM +

•••    I've been reading a lot of stuff about journals (as part of my blank-book-content-search), and a lot of stuff about the purpose of journalling. apparently the best reason is "to help yourself to be a happier, more effective, more human person." huh. I don't know what I think about that.
1:20 AM +

sunday, june 4

•••    my psychotic cat attacked my foot tonight. the bleeding has almost stopped, I think, but my toes are the wrong color and the wrong shape so I'm a little worried. I have my whole foot soaking in a baking pan full of warm water and betadine (which will probably dye my skin yellow on top of everything). between this and my seven-colors-of-purple leg, I don't know what my rheumatologist is going to say when I see him tomorrow. and apparently the cat needs some stronger sedatives. :P
10:27 PM +

•••    I'm a total sucker for blank books. I already have five in various states of fullness, but I bought a new one today. it's shiny blue with black pages. (yeah, I have lots of gel pens. I'm so trendy. ;P)

anyway, I can't decide what to do with my new book. I already have places for keeping poems, dreams, lists, drawings, music, and journally things. it needs to be something worth using gel pens for, but that includes pretty much anything worth saving. (I'm not into the whole only-my-deepest-thoughts-are-special thing. if you write your normal thoughts in special ink, they're all special. ;)

so. what would you do? I'm open to suggestions...
7:19 PM +

•••    the red sox suck. I thought the phillies sucked more, but apparently I was wrong. or maybe I'm cursed this summer and any city I'm in automatically has a losing baseball team. we'll see what happens to the rockies when I go to denver . . . hahaha.
6:49 PM +

•••    the central square world's fair is today. it won't be quite the same without morphine. they did their last stateside perfomance at the fair last spring. I was there for that, and I was there for the memorial concert a few months later.

there will be some good music today though. I'll be at the celtic stage. :)
2:08 PM +

•••    I could definitely go for a blueberry imaul.
1:28 AM +

•••    apt#820 is now terrapin gardens. I love those dancing turtles!
1:11 AM +