Thursday, March 26, 2009

Apparently it's the day for it...

According to my FSIL Natalie, Thursdays are the days for random thoughts. I've been having lots lately, so here are a few of them:

1. I went to turn in my Honor Code sheet about a week and a half ago. The middle-aged lady who was there mentioned I could use a shave. I didn't argue; it had been a couple of days. The only reason I hadn't shaved the night before (or that morning) was because I was up until like 0200 taking a midterm and shaving with a straight razor when you're very tired is not a good idea. Here's where the fun begins. As I turned to leave she informed me that they couldn't process my form until I came back and showed them a clean-shaven face. Yup, that's right, you actually read that, and she actually said it. After handing her a paper that said I give my word to abide by the Honor Code, and told her the reason why I was a little scruffy, the Honor Code office lady told me she couldn't take that word, and that I had to come back clean shaven to show them that I do, in fact, at age 28 know how to shave. I'm _very_ tempted to not go in for another week or so, then not shave again. Since going in once with a clean-shaven face means I'll always be clean shaven. Unreal.

2. Apparently I really like AC/DC these days. I've been listening to last.fm and pandora.com at work a lot lately, and hearing a lot of their older stuff that I don't have in my collection any more (temporarily). Loving it. My favorites are Jailbreak, Let There Be Rock, Rock And Roll Ain't Noise Pollution, and Who Made Who.

3. Two swear free weeks can come to a very sudden end when a burr in the edge of a very nice straight razor you are sharpening catches on the edge of your hone and breaks a big chip in the edge. Here's to starting over (on the razor and not swearing).

4. It's amazing to me how many people/companies/other entities want the government to stay the heck out of their lives until we are in a recession. Then they want to figure out every possible way to get the government in their lives (monetarily at least). Amusing.

5. Friction and Inertia are very interesting things. My favorite scripting language is Python. It's clean, enforces well-structured code, and awesome. However, I find myself using Perl (can be made clean with effort, can have well-structured code with effort) on lots of scripting projects at work because there is very little inertia in interfacing with system commands and regular expressions/pattern matching in Perl.

6. The cream almost _always_ comes off on the cookie side of the golden oreo with the crack. Since I like to split the cookie and lick the cream off, I find this _highly_ annoying.

7. One of my resolutions this year was to get back in shape. The 100 pushup challenge was a good start. I'm fairly well pleased with my progress there. In 2.5 months I've gone from being able to do 50 or so all at once to being able to do 75 _after_ doing 200 spread over 4 or 8 sets. Pullups (using the same progression) are progressing much more slowly, since my biceps and lats are working with my whole (too heavy) body, but we're making progress. Situps are another story. I've always hated situps, and consequently have yet to actually hold myself to the plan with situps. Once it warms up a little bit I'll start running again. That ought to be a hoot. But I can't ride my bike this summer and I have to do something. Plus, when I ever get back in any kind of shape I'll enjoy running like I used to.

8. There are only 2.5 weeks left of the semester. I have to get my butt in gear. Big time. which means that's enough random thoughts for one evening...

p.s. By the time most of you read this, you'll be getting the version that has been edited for clarity and proper-ness... :)