Independence Day

Good afternoon everyone.

Today is the 4th of July. Not one of my favorite holidays (but still a day off of work and school). Don’t get me wrong, I’m not being ‘Anti-America’ or anything, but it’s just the normal celebrations of fireworks and such I find a little boring. Sure fireworks are pretty, but I don’t think that they should be the center of the day. After all, it is Independence Day, the day that the Rebels and visionaries of the New World declared independence from The Crown. That is a lesson to take to heart on this day. To remember what we stand for as a nation, which is Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness. Important thoughts in these times, given the current political climate and economy woes.

Also on this subject, one of the most recognizable symbols of our country is the Statue of Liberty. Every one knows where it came from (France), but not everyone knows the story of the words on it (you know the “tired, hungry huddled masses” thing). Basically, after we got the thing, there was a fund raising effort for the Statue of Liberty for who knows what, and a woman named Emma Lazarus was asked to contribute a poem to help the effort, and part of the poem was inscribed there. So, all, I will leave you to your celebrations (with or without fireworks) with the poem in its entirety. So, here you are, The New Colossus, by Emma Lazarus:

The New Colossus

Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame,

With conquering limbs astride from land to land;

Here at our sea-washed, sunset gates shall stand

A mighty woman with a torch, whose flame

Is the imprisoned lightning, and her name

Mother of Exiles. From her beacon-hand

Glows world-wide welcome; her mild eyes command

The air-bridged harbor that twin cities frame.

“Keep ancient lands, your storied pomp!” cries she

With silent lips. “Give me your tired, your poor,

Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,

The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.

Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me,

I lift my lamp beside the golden door!”

~ Emma Lazarus [1883]

That’s all folks! Happy Independence Day!

T

Post No. 100

Good afternoon everyone,

As if you couldn’t tell by the title of this post, it is number 100. Hoora! I have been typing this thing for all of you for less than a year, and already I have reached a hundred plus pages of my grumblings, whining, complaining, boring, nerdy and at times hilarious thoughts. All in the format of my daily routine. And most have been done right here, where I sit at work, doing whatever it is that they pay me to do (I really think that most of the time it is to update this blog, and do home work, with a little of my job duties here and there).

You have all been here with me through all of the changes and additions to this blog. The most recent being The Cinema Project, my movie review page, and my photo page that I have only updated once (sadly). There will be more to come on that page, I just need to find the time to do so, being that I primarily use film, and I have to scan every picture.

I went through the checklist yesterday, so I will save you all the pain of that on my 100th post. I think that I will just summarize the checklist in one word: BUSY.

I really wish that I had something more to say, something spectacular and celebratory for this momentous occasion, but I do not. I think I will say “Thank you for reading everybody!”

In other news, George Carlin passed away recently.

A hilarious man, and he will be missed.

With this being such a momentous occasion, (my 100th post here on this blog), there are a few resolutions on this post that I would like to make as well. They are as follows:

1. This blog is called “The Mad Scientist”. With a title like that, you would expect there to be more ‘science’ type stuff, and I know that I have made a similar resolution like this in the past, but I will be posting more stuff that I am actually doing in class, rather than just complaining about how time consuming that it is.

2. I will try to not complain as much, and make more of an effort to have this thing be actually ‘interesting’*

*results may vary. What I consider to be interesting may greatly differ from what you are entertained by.

3. I am going to get in shape, and will keep you all posted in the form of News Bulletins. In fact, here is the first:

Professor T. Announces Crackdown On Love Handles!

In a recent press conference, Professor T. announced that there will be a city wide crackdown on the growing problem of love handles. He is optimistic about the progress of this particular program, despite the failures of similar programs in the past. He plans on tackling this spreading issue with a better diet, and more exercise. More on this story as it develops.

4. Also, I plan on posting more on the other pages, The Cinema Project and the PHOTOGRAHY blog, so just in case you don’t get enough of me from this page, you will have more opportunities to enjoy all of my witty banter and beautiful pictures.

That’s the show today folks. Please check out The Cinema Project for my review of Futurama- Beast with a Billon Backs!

Good night everyone!

T

Some Lazy Afternoon Thoughts

Good afternoon everyone,

Well, I have now taken to updating this thing just about once a week. This has resulted from:

A: I do not have enough time to update this every day.

B: Most of the people who I keep this for do not read it on a regular basis.

C: I do not have enough time to update this every day.

So, I will update as often as I can, but right now it looks like it will just be on the weekends. Part B from above does not concern me as much, because I enjoy the writing anyway, and since I do not have a “comments” feature (on purpose), I do not know how many secret fans that I have. Or secret critics… but those people can remain secret.

Now let’s get down to the nitty gritty blogging. Thing of note the first: A correction. In my last post I said that nothing has been happening at work of note. What a liar I am! And where are my manners!? We had a group outing at the Hollywood Connection. Good times were had by all. After that, we went to the manager’s house, and partied until the wee hours of the morning. Good times. Now for the checklist:

Under Grad Lab- We had a "Laboratory Practical Examination" on Friday. That consist of an experiment that we have to complete in one lab section, and it is all on our own. Other than being a little slow at first, I basically sailed through the thing, except that I had done one thing wrong that I had to go back and fix. The Professor pushed back a lot of due dates for some of our other experiments, so that helps a little with the time planning.

O.D.E.’s and Linear Algebra- I know I mentioned the Maple project before, and what a pain it is becoming. Well, I thought that it was due yesterday, and spent about 5 hours Thursday evening working on it. I went to hand it in yesterday morning, and was informed that I have another couple of weeks time on this thing. I almost asked the Teacher (I say teacher because he is a grad student, and not an actual doctor of any sort, but then again, neither am I… yet) to repeat himself, because my brain had temporarily blanked with rage. At least I have more time though. For what I don’t know exactly.

Other things have not really been going at all. I have not done anything interesting in the form of recreation in quite some time, since the afternoon skiing. And it may stay that way most of the way through summer. Other things of note: From Russia with Love’s foot is doing better, still a little bruised, but ok. I also have a bit of a rash that looks like the Chicken Pox, but it is not I swear. The Dermatologist told me it was some kind of a reaction I had to a flu virus, and that it will go away soon. So if you see me and are wondering what is wrong with my arms, I hope that you will read this first, because I am tired of wearing long sleeve shirts in the middle of June.

Also: notice to the right of this page, I have new links. One is for the Photography page (I will update soon I promise!) and the other is a new page that I have made just for movie reviews. Yes, that means that I will no longer be posting them here, and some of the reviews may be up before the movie is out! So visit away, and become privy to information that few people have!

That will do it for me today folks, because I have to get back to… well… whatever it is that I do here at work.

T

Taking Back A Saturday

Good afternoon everyone,

Yeah, it’s been a while. But my life has been keeping me sufficiently busy. I will run down the checklist in a moment. First, let me finish this intro. Ok, maybe I am done. But I did finish…

Under Grad Lab- This class is taking up more and more of my time. The experiments are getting harder, and more tedious. For those of you who have not already heard my grumblings from this class, they are great in number. The experiment that we have been working on for the last couple of weeks is still not done, and I am going to have to put in some extra hours this Tuesday at the lab to make up for the ‘falling behind’. That and the Lab reports are getting longer and longer, and more and more complicated. I do dislike ‘proving equations’, moreover: I hate derivations. Yes, I know they are critical in any scientific paper, but they are also a critical pain in my ass.

O.D.E.s and Linear Algebra- I have not said much about this class as of yet, but there really isn’t much to say. It’s math. It’s complicated. It’s requiring Maple computation projects. Makes me really glad I got a lap top (with Maple software), so now I don’t have to spend every waking hour of my life in the Physics computer lab doing this crap and the other stuff (other stuff: se above in the paragraph called “Under Grad Lab”).

That is about it for the school updates. Work is just work. Nothing new has changed. Nothing else has been going on out of the ordinary worthy of mentioning.

I decided that I needed a little getaway, so From Russia with Love and I went water skiing today. We met up with my parents who were already up at the camp site, and spent the night there last night. We woke this morning, ate breakfast, and headed straight for the boat.

I did one run. There, I said it. I got on the ski once (notice I said ‘ski’, not plural, because I love solemn skiing). I am so out of shape that is all I could muster for the day. But From Russia with Love was a bit feistier, and she kept it up until she sustained quite an injury. Apperantly, she rolled sideways and one of the skis got tangled in the rope. She was drug under water for a little bit until her foot finally popped out of the binding. It looks worse that it feels was what she kept telling us, but there was no way that thing was not hurting something wicked.

So we both were done in at about 1pm this afternoon, but we still rode around in the boat and had a fantastic time. now, I sit here at work, and she is at Insta-Care having her foot X-rayed (I’m sorry honey, I love you!).

I also went to see The Happening with From Russia with Love. Now, I know I usually do movie reviews once I have seen them. I am not going to do so this time. All I am going to say is that for a movie called “The Happening”, you would naturally expect more to, well, "Happen”. It wasn’t bad really, just wait for the dollar theaters.

T

What, Me Blog?!?

Good evening everyone.

Has it really been a week? Have I really been neglecting every one for seven entire days? You know, that could be one day for every Deadly Sin, but my life is not that interesting.

My week has consisted of school, work and other activities of the fantastic and magical such as home work. If you are not familiar with the concept of home work, it is work that you should normally do at school, but you can take it home with you! You can do it in your free time! Because everyone knows I have way too much of that…

School- School has been going sufficiently fine, even now that I my math class has started up. Under Grad Lab is eating up more and more of my time, and the math class is requiring more time than I had previously estimated, because the Professor is having us do Maple projects in addition to the normal grind of class work and studying.

Work- Work is getting more and more irritating, because I am having to do more phone time. That would not be a bad thing if people were competent, patient and somewhat intelligent. Sadly, this is not the case. The average person in the world has none of the previously mentioned qualities. That makes my shift an exercise in futility, trying to explain simple concepts like: “we are sold out” and such to the severely mentally retarded. Few things can frustrate me to the degree that my phone hours do. All in all, it just makes me loose all my faith in the human race, that we are an astonishing and exceptional species, and we deserve to have our mark left on the universe, so that some one, at some point far away from now may find a trace of our civilization, and think: “what an amazing place in time this place must have been”. As far as I am concerned, I could not give a rat’s ass about the far future. Really. If you want to see the darkest and dumbest side of people, be a policeman or work in any type of retail. It will suck out and destroy any faith in humanity that you may have.

On a lighter side, now that I am done ‘venting’, From Russia with Love and I went ad saw the new Hulk movie. So, here is my review:

The Incredible Hulk- This movie was much better than any others about this particular guy that I have seen. Just like Iron Man, I never really read the comic books, because they were boring. But they made for a damn good movie. It was not as good as other superhero movies, but definitely worth the price of admission. “Hulk smash! Me type!”

T

Weekend Update

Good afternoon everyone,

Well, it’s time for the weekend update. Yes, I know I have not posted much recently, but there simply isn’t a lot going on in my life to post. There is only one class that I currently have, and it is going well I think. So here is the one class checklist:

Undergrad Lab- We have been playing with radioactive materials these past couple of weeks. It has been somewhat cool, using the Geiger Counter and all. However, this has been the most time consuming and tedious lab to date. The Post-report is due on Tuesday, and my lab partner and I have not finished with all of our data plots yet. That is going to be an interesting push, but I think that we should do well.

Other things have been going great. From Russia with Love’s birthday was this week, and for this momentous occasion I got her a PSP. She loves it, and I feel that I have some competition for her attention now. Usually it is the other way around, but that means I have more time to play with my laptop.

Oh, by the way, I bought a laptop.

I don’t know if I have mentioned this in other posts (I don’t have them to read over right now) but it has me giddy with delight. I just need to procure a couple of programs for it, and it will be the best tool I can think of in aiding my education. After all, I am a Physics major, which makes me a nerd of high order, and we nerds love our gizmos and electronic what-nots.

T

Sunday Slacking

Good afternoon everyone,

Well, I updated yesterday with all of the new things, and the ‘what’s-goings-on’ in my last week. So do not expect much of that today. Except for last night…

Last night- After work I gave one of my co-workers a ride home, and then I went to a bar and met up with some old friends, Double-A and B Dawg. We hung out and played pool until the wee hours of the morning. It was nice to see them again, especially since I have no life to speak of outside of school and work.

Robot names- I found a fun thing on the web the other day. What you do is enter a name, and it turns it into an acronym for a robot. Sounds nerdy and pointless right? And, yes, it is both of those. So being the fan of nerdy and pointless that I am; here are two names that I entered into the Robot Name Gizmometer Thingy:

T.echnician
O.ptimized for
N.octurnal
Y.elling

And-

Y.tterbium
E.lectronic
L.ife-form
E.ngineered for
N.octurnal
A.ssassination

Cool right?

Oh, and last night at work (in the seemingly endless amount of free time we seem to have) I wrote a ‘rules and code of conduct’ for time travel at the work place. Here they are, the Guidelines for Time Travel in the Workplace:

Then the rules and code of conduct are as follows:

1. Any time travel must be done off work property. Driving 88 miles per hour in the parking lot is prohibited.

2. If you go back in time, and wake up me before 8 am, your time travel privileges are null and void.

3. If you travel back in time to the night before, you must take me with you so I may have a beer with myself.

4. Any rips, tears, fluctuations or wrinkles in the Space-Time Continuum are the sole responsibility of the traveler, and not the persons in any past or future time frames.

5. If you go forward in time and wish to procure future delicious ingredients for a pie, you must share this pie with your fellow co-workers.

6. You must also share the recipe for the above said Time Pie.

Lastly but not least, I noticed something on the freeway today that made my ‘ways to publicly announce that you are lame’ list.

-I saw two bikers that actually had ‘Wild Hogs’ embroidered on their jackets. Yes, from the lame ass movie with Jon Travolta. It’s bad enough that they have to have the embroidered jackets, but the lack of creativity and taste? Come on people…

That’s about all the blogging I can muster for the day everyone, so good night and good luck on the Monday. Oh, and one more thing before I go:

Welcome Back Hank and Dean!

T