Confessions of a Sta

Hey guys!

So last week I posted a thread in Strats about doing a writeup about keyboarding styles, and I'm getting to it. Unfortunately with the end of the quarter bearing down on me I am faced with many a project to be completed. Luckily, being the computer science major that I am, have decided to be one of those losers that makes school stuff about nerd stuff and am doing an SC project as well. Here's an update of my full plate in case anyone likes computer stuff. In fact, I'm working on them right now! Well, I guess I'm procrastinating right now but that is okay.

1) Keyboarding Styles:
link to thread
here
Basically the idea is that if we looked in depth at what we were doing with our hands we might be able to work out some of the kinks in our macroing. This one is kinda delayed as I have to go to school. Lame!

2) Build Order Simulator:
Part of my first quarter program at school is learning to code in Python, a high level open source computer language. What I (and my reluctant partner) are working on is a program that simulates a game of Starcraft and spits out information like your mining rate and in depth build orders. The general idea came from the fact that unit and building build times are generally multiples of the build time for the SCV (sorry toss and zerg players 0.1 won't feature you guys.) So the simulation will run in "rounds" with the rounds being the time it takes for one SCV to be built at your main. The sim will probably run through building at your main, your natural and maybe the mineral only. I'll post it when I'm done (or not if I epic fail )

Music Genre Ontology:

So this one isn't really about Starcraft but I figured I would let everyone know about it. This is my big project for the quarter. Basically, an Ontology in computer terms is a way of presenting information in a hierarchical structure, sort of like the Organization of Living Things. However it differs in that it is not purely a taxonomy, other relationships between things are allowed other than "is a" relationships (like dog is a mammal.) Stanford University makes a program called Protege which allows for you to build an ontology and have it fact check against itself. The idea of the whole thing is that if we move away from random internet stuff and instead have data organized in ontologies it will be easier to get to data. Kinda cool stuff.

Keep the Peace

So on the list of things you probably shouldn't do, cutting a whole in your tower so your video card will fit. Of course it was a bad idea, but it made it a year without dieing. The question of course is what is dea, the video card or the PCI slot? Any rate, new computer stuff yay!

As a side note, gutting my compy to move it to a new case? Good idea or bad idea?

How do you deal with situations your uncomfortable in? For most of my time this quarter of college I've been dealing with people looking for approval for their drug use. Here's how the situation will go down.

Me- "hey people what's up?"
Person 1- "nothing I'm giong to take some adderal tomorrow!"
Person 2- "Cool!"
me- "hmm..."

Now I don't want to be overbearing on people, but some times there are some people who I just want to say "What the fuck is wrong with you?" I'm not saying that no one should ever do anything bad, but how is one supposed to react to things like this? My friends wouldn't be telling me if they didn't think there was something wrong with what they were doing, a conclusion I draw from the way that they tell me. How does one respond casually to something that they disagree with? I figured next time I would just say "that's a little fucked up." and be done with it.

How do you deal with BS like this?

In lieu of an interesting speech about the state of drug use and depression, I made my most epic playlist ever! Now I bet you are probably thinking "u suck u thru a buncha tracks in a playlist GG no0b noRE" However this momentous occasion is quite the contrary.
You see normally when I make mixtapes I am a big snob, like John Cusak in High Fidelity. I normally do ten track mixtapes or if I'm feeling bold, two sets of right tracks as I feel like any more and I wouldn't really be saying anything with my playlist. But this week I've changed all of that. This is my sixty track Death Cab for Cutie Playlist. Why? Because it is a really fucking long way from Olympia to Eugene OR. Roadtrip! (alone!)

+ Show Spoiler +

Things I learned yesterday:

1) TL is not my home and not a place to spout my pessimistic political jargon
2) Piracy is not that big of a deal
3) Links are useful in web posts
4) I'm not exactally sure how to use some of the commands for the forum
5) Context is difficult to prove to people
6) Proofreading prevents misunderstanding
7) I had a shitty Tuesday
8) I can be a dick, though most of the time I think I'm nice
9) I finally got people to read my blog! But for the wrong reasons 8(

Sorry everyone (again)

So a more appropriate title would be "The Issue of Mainstream Voters," however seeing from my last blog post that a lot of you kiddies are assholes I figure a good clincher title would get you in here. Well on with the show!
I was recently looking at a voter map of the US that showed how states swung in the '00 and '04 elections and noticed that while Michigan went Gore and Kerry respectively, most of the state's suburban and rural counties went Bush both times. Now having relatives in the Michigan area I've noticed that most of it's citizens aren't voting on the basis of social issues like abortion and whatnot. Most people who swung Bush voted on an economic and foreign policy agenda. For the last eight years Michigan residents have been taking it from behind becuase of free market policy and slow uptake on progressive energy policy and yet they are still voting Republican. Why?
Let's get right down to it. White people only vote for two reasons: they feel guilty or they feel ashamed. Now when I say white people it would be appropriate to define them as Left wing tax and spend middle class liberals and poor conservatives. These two groups will constantly vote against their own favor to alleviate these symptoms. Poor conservatives want to associate themselves with the upper class party leaders because it makes them feel better about their economic situation. Liberals, ie people in Seattle and most of California feel guilty about their prejudging of African Americans and are embarrassed about how their WASP relatives on the East Coast have been acting. They consistently vote to pour their tax dollars into programs that don't actually change the social structure of society but help us all sleep at night.
Now no one likes people who say everything is wrong and then don't give a solution so here's something for you to think over. My fast track way to end both bigotry and intercity violence is rallying rural white poor and minority poor together and through education and services rasing them out of their destitute living conditions. But more on that later

As always, Discuss.

PS the person that left a 1/5 on my last blog post,
Fuck you. Grow some fucking balls its the internet people can't actually get back at you physically don't be such a liitle wuss

I was thinking about how Batman is really just the greatest superhero of the DC Universe and how much crime fighting is awesome. How would you feel about abuse of Torrenters? Not like everyone who uses Bit Torrent gets beat up and thrown in jail, but maybe like I head over to Pirate Bay and upload something called "Crysis Warhead" that is really "fuck your computer really bad." Bad experiences tend to make people stray away from things. Thoughts?

Spoiler









So I don't know if any of you follow Bleach in Japan either by Dattebayo fansubs or just being able to speak Japanese, but yesterday was the end of the filler story arc before the plot picks back up along the comics. So in the "All New Captain Amagai Story Arc" there is this guy who replaced one of the other captains that left name Amagai. Long story short he was actually tring to kill the Captain Commander to avenge his father. So after ichigo whips the shit out of him every other effing character shows up and they are all like "btw he didn't kill your father." So the dude goes cold up and kills himself. Now this is a Y-7 show. That's fucked up. I'm not sure I'm comfortable knowing that three out of four kids in Japan just saw a good guy kill himself on TV. That's bound to have some social repercussions in a few years. Any comments?


PS Goku's power lvl is at 9000!!!! and then he goes Bankai! Illustrate and discuss.

So remember that blog post I made about how I was sorry for writing that thing that got my post closed? Well I got another one closed and I'm not sorry this time.

I asked a question recently in the general forums about nominal vs real oil prices. This was not a question about homework, as per interpreted. It was simply something that I was curious about. Just thought you should all know.

Today I posted some stupid shit that got my post closed; and for that I am truly sorry. Because of this, I would like to post a journal entry of mine that I feel is somewhat insightful and hopefully Chill will accept it as and apology for me being a dumb fuck. As some background this was idea was brought on by two events. The first was me running into an ex girlfriend at college and think about how while I pined after her for so long I didn't really like her anymore. The second event was a friend of mine had asked advice on how to ask a boy out. What I told her was actually what I had planned to tell her when I was going to ask her for a date a couple years ago:

"Now <girls name> I know I have had trouble communicating with you recently..."

(and you nod or something)


But the truth is that I like you

(Now if you hadn't interrupted me here what i would have said)


Now I know you don't like me in that way, I would never expect that of you.

But I do want you to feel that way.

So I want you to go out... On a date... with me sometime so that I can get to know you better.

I know love rarely comes at first sight and I'm not expecting it to.

But I'm nice, I really am despite how I come off some time, so I just want you to give me a chance.

9:48pmClark

Now unfortunately the whole thing didn't go as planned, and so I was left with a feeling wondering why things like this happen. So here goes:

It Seems like everyone wants what they can't have in High School. I suppose everyone always wants what they can't have. People alone long for friends. People With Friends want boyfriends and girlfriends. People with stability want passion and yet people with only passion find themselves feeling empty and alone. Is being content mean that we have simply given up in life, that we have resigned ourselves to float aimlessly in the Vast Machine?

I believe that the only way to be truly happy is to take this cycle backwards. (At this point I comment that this is what I should write songs about as I have writers block when it comes to lyrics)

Those who yearn for the excitement of short days and long night should take joy in being able to wake up next to someone they care about and cares about them. Those of us who surround and shield themselves with friends and social gatherings should enjoy the solidarity of just a cup of coffee and a paper and pen.This is not a call for us to scramble for lovers to take to bed. This a work order for a suburban home with a white picket fence built from out love the beauty around us.

However it is that very same love that must remain separate from this great circle of soon-to-be-inverted lust. For out desire to love must remain ever heart wrenching as it is through that love that we can truly enjoy all of life, from the bitterness of the coffee we drink when we journal to the concrete villages that we reside in. Ans even enjoy the pain that comes from a love unrequited because, above all else, it is through our love that know that we are alive.


-Clark