I just finished watching Van Wilder. Funny as hell, but with a message. If you pay too much attention to the future, you forget about the now. That just makes a lot of sense to me right now. I mean, why do we bother getting an education or a job? So we can live in luxury and have pleasurable lives, right? Yet we put ourselves through such hell now for a promise of a brighter future that might not even happen. We deny ourselves of luxury and pleasure now because we think it'll pay off in the end. But what if it doesn't? Then you've just lived an unnecessarily unpleasant life.

I mean, I guess the extremes of instant gratification could quickly get you in preeeetty serious trouble, but before he gets "set straight," Van makes a good case: "Don't take life too seriously- you'll never get out alive."

BLEEEEEEHHHHH... just sucked it up on a mechanics of solids test. Maaaaaaaaan, and I studied so freaking hard for this. I did 10+ pages- front & back- of practice problems. It's my hardest class, but I thought I finally had this material down. Aarrrrrrgggg, there better be some pretty serious curvage going on here, otherwise I'm screwed.

No wonder my clothes have felt so uncomfortable all day! I was washing my hands a sec ago, and I look in the mirror and see something protruding from my collar. Upon closer inspection, I notice it's the tag on my undershirt. I've been wearing my wifebeater backwards all day! Hah, you'd think the choking feeling woulda tipped me off.

Class was cancelled today cuz of the weather. I was quite surprised at first, cuz I didn't think it was all that bad out. But then I walked to the cafeteria and nearly slipped to death. Ok, so I guess cancelling was pretty reasonable.

*Totally unproductive day. Shoulda studied my butt off... didn't.

So after taking a shower, I took a look outside, and the snow coverage was getting decently thick (like 1/2 an inch... whooaaaaa Nellie!!! =P), so I decided to get changed and have some fun in the snow. I was just gonna slide around a bit and then go back in, but I met up with YiLin, and we went hunting for fresher snow. It was fun- we slid on like handicap ramps, in the street, park benches, everything. But I scraped up my hands pretty bad. =/

So then I come back to the dorm, and Nien tells me I smell like B.O. And I'm like, "What!?!? I didn't even work up a sweat!" Bleehhhh... so now I gotta go take another shower. Maaaaaaaan... my skin's gonna be all dry, hahaha.

This afternoon I was in the bathroom, and I was staring down at the floor tiles as I often do. (Maybe that's why it always takes me so long to go to the bathroom- cuz I don't maintain concentration on the task at hand, hahaha.) But anyways, so I was looking at the tiles, and it's got this repeating pattern of squares and rectangles, and I noticed that for any given combination of four connected rectangles I chose, a tessellation of the figure could be made that would use up every rectangle on the floor. Hard to explain, but I think I'm on the verge of some kinda deeper understanding of geometry here or something. So I sat there staring at the floor tiles for like 10+ minutes trying to disprove my theory- seems to hold; hah, I musta been on the can for like nearly half an hour or something, hahaha.

Oh yea, and during my nap this afternoon I dreamed I had some simple, elegant method for solving a nonlinear (?, not exactly sure if that's what it's called) system of equations. Of course I couldn't remember any of the details when I woke up. But yea, it was probably on my mind cuz I was doing dynamics hw last night, and for the first time that I can recall, I encountered a system of equations that I absolutely didn't know how to solve with my trusty TI-83+. The professor had recommended a software package called TKSolver, which we can use in the aerospace labs. But since I'm in the habit of not starting hw until midnight of the day it's due, going to the lab wasn't much of an option. So after some searching on the net, I came across a shareware program called MiniTK which has the basic equation solving engine of the real TKSolver. It has an extremely old school interface, but it gets the job done- I highly recommend it.

So it's snowing today. Crikey. It was so nice this weekend, like in the 70's I reckon (I'm trying to work that phrase into my vocabulary, I reckon)- and now it's snowing. Quite a surprise. We shrug and call it "Texas weather," but honestly? I bet this happens everywhere, and people around the States'll call it like "Mississippi weather" or "Kansas weather" and think they're oh so special. Rooooiiiiiight. So yea, Eric told me there was gonna be wushu training today, so I all the way walk down to Rec Sports Center, which is literally the farthest thing from my dorm on campus. So going down there really wasn't too bad, but on the way back, the snow starts picking up again, and it's like awww HELL! Yea... bleeeehhhh... suckage.

So I've been watching downloaded movies all weekend. Good times. I got like three different versions of Jet Li's new movie Hero, but like each copy had something wrong with it. =( Yea, that sucks like mad.

Man, my back has been killing me when I sleep at night the last couple of days. I've got the top bunk, and we set up this like blanket thing under my matress which doubles as a curtain for Nien on the lower bunk, but occasionally, he'll stuff the curtain part under my mattress. And it's really not a big difference (since it's a thin blanket), but the little lump just kills my back. Call me "princess and the pea" or whatever, but I've been tossing around at night trying to find a comfortable position. Bleehhh.

*I spent all afternoon on a codec downloading spree to try and get Hero to work. Once I got one thing working, something else would screw up- I musta done system restore like 5 times today. So I think I've finally got everything working now... maaaaaaaan, who the hell uses XVID video or AC3 audio? geez... makes things very difficult for me.

I went and saw a performance of The Vagina Monologues tonight with Jane & Alice. It was ummm... [interesting]. There's a lot of humor interspersed with the occasional deep piece. There were parts of it I didn't really understand or couldn't really relate to, but on the whole it was quite entertaining. From what I understood, the show was all about awareness and (female) empowerment, but I think it'd be wrong to label the show as a strictly feminist work. I didn't think it was as controversial as it was made out to be- it was a lesson in keeping an open mind and empathizing I guess.

ugggghhhh... I've spent like 2 hours working on mechanics of solids hw, and only finished one measly problem. Bleeehhhhh... this stuff makes no sense. Statically indeterminate conditions suxors!

ARRRGGGG... I just sucked up my first dynamics test a sec ago. Dang it, this reminds me of the first test in statics. Man, I always think I'm such a Scooby Doo until I take the first test, and then I'm remarkably humbled. *sigh* And I guess I used to count on the stupidity of others & a curve to boost me. But these days, classes are getting smaller and therefore more elite (; I'm going on the assumption that the stupid people have been weeded out). Man, I guess that means that I'm one of the stupid people now, huh? =( blehhhh... stressed as hell now. Need to unwind...

Man, so I ended up skipping management class today- but not on purpose! The teacher had told us that we wouldn't have class on the 18th, a Tuesday. And so in my day planner, under Feb. 18, I wrote "no MAN320F class." It wasn't until 12:00, when the class usually ends, and Kent called me to see if I went to class, that I started to suspect something was awry. I checked the class website, and sure enough, class hadn't been cancelled... I checked the class calendar, and to my chagrin, class was cancelled on March 18th, also a Tuesday. Maaaaaaan, dang it, why does February have to have exactly 28 days? grrrrrrr...

Uuuuggghhhh... I've got a terrible habit of forgetting my soap on the rack in the shower. When I'm lucky, it'll still be sitting there or nearby when I finally remember to go looking for it... or the next time I shower. Well, this time I wasn't so lucky. I'd already shampooed up my hair and was completely wet when I realized that I didn't have any soap with me. It was like awwww, CRAP! *sigh* yet another chapter in my saga of communal shower perils.

Yea, I guess that's another pain-in-the-butt thing about communal showers- when you forget something, it's a lot of trouble to have to run back to the dorm & grab it. I guess I coulda put some dirty clothes back on, or wrapped up in my towel and got it all sweaty. But naw, I decided to try showering with shampoo instead. Ummmm... well, I guess it did the job... kinda. It seems to leave this residual slime that is really hard to wash off of your skin. And I don't know how well it actually cleaned- rather than smelling fresh & clean, I just smell like flowers... LOTS of flowers (lavender to be exact). Arrgggg, I think I'll hafta lay on the deodorant extra thick tomorrow to compensate for this effeminate scent.

So on the way back to Austin, my brother & I were driving under this overpass, and on the overpass there were these two bicyclists riding behind a car. And the car stops, but only one of the bikes stops. The other guy slams into the back of the car, and flies of his bicycle onto the trunk of the car, hahaha. It was so funny. And then it looked like he was trying to act like nothing happened, hahaha.

Anyways, yea, today at wushu, I was soooooo close to nailing an aerial. I've had a really messed up butterfly kick for the last couple weeks, cuz I'd dip my head waaay too low, and it'd kinda look like an aerial tilted 45 degrees. But yea, it just started from there, and I decided to intentionally tilt it more & more towards the vertical. I'd say it's definitely more of an aerial than a butterfly now. I tried doing it a lot of different ways- with a running start and prep hop, I think it's basically there. Built up a lot of confidence, but I'm still afraid to extend my legs all the way. So I did what Michael refers to as an "Arabian," which I guess is like a no-handed cartwheel with the legs tucked. I think I'm pretty close... I can get it. That's a funny thing about the wushu club: I feel like I'm losing a lot of my traditional kung fu skills, but in their place, I'm gaining all these oddball techniques, like the one-leg jump front slap, jump outside crescent, butterfly, and aerial. Strangely though, my tornado kick has gone to heck- it's just gotten progressively worse and worse, and now my one-leg landing is like gone. =(

Ok, well anyways, I've been hanging out with the old crew from Plano West a lot recently: Mike, Terry, Tony, Allen, and Yuto. Reminds me of the good ol' days. Fun times, fun times. Man, in retrospect, I liked high school so much more than I'm liking college right now. *sigh*

omg... it snowed last night here in Plano. That's just insane. Only two days earlier, it was burning up, and now it's freezing. Crazy. And since I didn't foresee it being cold, I decided not to bring a jacket along this time- bad idea. Blehhh.

*So yea, anyways, I went back to Plano this weekend cuz it was my Grandpa's 88th birthday. My parents held a dinner party for him. Good eating. But yea, my brother didn't wanna stay for very long at all this weekend. We arrived home at like noon on Saturday and left on Sunday morning. We were home for a total of less than 24 hours.

Bill Clinton came to UT and gave a speech today, but I couldn't manage to get a ticket. =( I was really disappointed. Those tickets went like hotcakes. But yea, so afterwards, I had Nien give me the recap... seems like I woulda enjoyed listening to him talk. =/

The student body staged a walkout from class today in protest of the war on Iraq. I had a test so I didn't even consider it, but even if I didn't have the test, I don't know if I would have walked out. I mean, sure, I oppose the war on Iraq, but how does a bunch of students walking out of class at a single university accomplish anything. If the students think that their actions will actually change anything, they're being remarkably naive. The UT student government passed a resolution opposing the war, as did the Austin city council (I think)- yet Washington couldn't care less. I think both organizations were wasting their time; at their prospective levels, they are both powerless to stop the events that have been set into motion by a machine far beyond their control.

Political rant. I dunno, I guess I've kinda become disillusioned with politics and anything of that nature (including political activism). I just think that the people hold so much less power in our government than we'd like to think. "It's a democracy- a government for the people, by the people." "Every vote counts. You too can make a difference." What a crock... and anyways, it's a republic- I don't know why they throw around the term democracy so much. And can an elected official ever really say he's representing the views of his constituents, given our society's abyssmally low voter turnout rates? But I mean, I guess I can sympathize- like, I try to keep up with politics at the national level, but stuff like on the city/county (and sometimes even state) level doesn't command much of my attention. It just takes too much effort to keep up with the issues and to know each candidate's platform. And that's just the problem- people don't care enough, so they don't vote. The people who get elected are the ones with the money to motivate people to go to the polls. Money is power, people. And the people with the money are the ones who control the agenda, not the electorate. Politics suck.

So I crammed all night for my management test today but still didn't finish my reading. So I was still reading my textbook when I got to the classroom, then Kent comes up and asks me what I'm reading. And I'm like, "Uhhhhh... the textbook?" And he's like, "Ehhh, that's not what mine looks like." So I look around at what everyone else is frantically studying, and that's when I realize that I bought the wrong freaking textbook! Grrrrr... not to mention I was studying all the wrong material; geez, you think I'd have realized when I was reading and nothing sounded familiar at all. Hah, needless to say, I didn't do so hot on the test. Man, might hafta change this class to pass/fail.

Some time in the afternoon, after putting some serious effort into the mechanics of solids hw, I decided that it wasn't getting done, no matter what. And therefore, I decided to forget it and go to the expo anyway. I wasn't really looking too hard for a job or internship or whatever... I realized that I had a pitiful resume. So I didn't even bother getting dressed up or anything... I just kinda went, looked around, and grabbed some free goodies. Whatever.

*I've got real qualms with doing the dishes. I just reeeaaaally hate it. I'm not good at it- takes me forever, and I use gallons upon gallons to clean nearly nothing. Nien & I got a bunch of tupperware and plastic silverware, thinking it'd be better than having real dishes & silverware. But then we'd end up having to wash those too... yes, we washed & reused plastic utensils. But yea, I got so sick of doing dishes, that I stopped eating cuz of the hassle associated with it. Don't get me wrong, I'm still hungry, but I just sit there not doing anything about it. I was talking to Tony, and we came to the conclusion that we'd both probably starve before willingly doing dishes, hahaha. But yea, I just recently got around to buying some paper bowls and plastic forks. Very convenient. Problem is, most of my canned food is soups... Ain't nothing more ghetto than drinking soup with a fork, hahaha.

Man, the Spring engineering expo is today, but I still haven't finished my mechanics of solids hw yet. Blehhhh... I feel like Cinderella when she can't go to the ball until she's finished all her chores. Man, where are the fairy godmothers when you need 'em? =/

My first Diff Eq quiz was today- I think I did alright. I still don't get Bernoulli equations though. Blecchhh.

The aerospace department held a forum/seminar on the shuttle today. Dr. Mark, former deputy administrator of NASA, was the only speaker I found particularly interesting. They had a guy talk about re-entry maneuvers and dynamics, and another guy talked about materials used in the space shuttle- namely the thermal tiles and the foam on the external tank. One of the points brought up that I thought was notable was that commercial airplanes, before being allowed to carry passengers, undergo like 1000 flights of testing. By comparison, the shuttles have flown barely 100 missions total; therefore, the shuttle is still very much an experimental vehicle, and we should regard it as such.

Well, I've had some time to reflect on the shuttle, and I guess I've kind of figured out what it is that I think... Well, first of all, I want to point out how much we all take for granted the hard work that so many people have to put in to make the shuttle successful. It's like we think that just cuz it's in the hands of NASA, everything's gonna work out fine cuz NASA's a bunch of brainiacs. It's so much complex science and math, I think it's a wonder that things do work. But yea, I think the tragedy was really a setback; mankind will still go into space. But also, it'll make us take a serious look at where our space program is now- there was talk in the mid 90's of designing a vehicle to replace the current shuttle. The plans kinda just pettered out, but now think they'll be put back on the drawing board. By any measure, the shuttle is definitely high tech, but then again, it was also high tech like 20 years ago... what will the cutting edge technology of today be like?

I think more than a sense of sadness & grief, the tragedy has instilled a new sense of dedication in me. It really illustrates how NASA isn't infallible. They still need good people to run their operations... will I be one of those people some day? I realize now more than ever, how much progress we still have to make.

Man, today must have been my worst day of archery yet! For the last 2 classes we've been moving back 3 meters a day. Well, today, we were shooting at 9m, and I managed to completely miss a 4ft by 4ft target! And not just once... four times! How embarassing. It took me over an hour to figure out what I was doing wrong (and have been doing wrong since the first day...)- I was looking through the sight on the wrong side of the string. Man, "I am such the dumb," hahaha.

So Jennie & Teresa came by tonight peddling their phone cards for CTSA (the enemy!!! =P). But yea, they said the cards were free, with the catch that you had to fill out an info sheet for a bank (Chase). Well, not wanting to be a jerk, I agreed to it. Then I started filling it out, and saw that I had to put down my social security number too. And I guess I've been trained to be paranoid about giving out my SSN or something, but I was like, arrrrrgggggg. After much hesitation, I eventually gave up my information. I dunno, a big respectable company like Chase bank wouldn't go aorund screwing people over, would they? I hope not...

In other news, Teresa wrote an article for the Daily Texan (the UT newspaper) about student/faculty reactions to the shuttle tragedy. And I was chosen to be the token aerospace student to comment. Most of my discussion was edited out, and the only thing that remained was a phrase reading: "'It is still our destiny to go into space,' Daniel ____, an aerospace engineering honors senior said." Hmmmm, I dunno, I don't think I talk like that, but hey, whatever- I don't think anyone ever really reads the paper anyways, haha.

*Tonight at wushu, Michael & I were messing around with swords, play-dueling and all, and he ends up slicing me across the knuckles. Didn't notice till Andrew pointed it out that I was bleeding semi-profusely. Yowsa.

My brother took me to Saba Bluewater Cafe downtown for dinner tonight in celebration of my b-day. Good eats... filled up on appetizers and chips, hahaha.

Yea, and my mom called from Taiwan to wish me a happy birthday too. Nice.

So today is my 19th birthday... the big 19. I dunno, I remember back when I was a kid, how much I looked forward to my birthday. Now it's nothing special... just like any other day. "Another day... lying in my bed, another day staring at the ceiling... I'm used to it by now." ~ Telepopmusik - Breathe

We discussed the Columbia incident today in dynamics class. The professor told us about the thermal tiles and about typical re-entry and attitude adjustment. Apparently the big key now is to see what debris is found the farthest northwest to tell what probably broke off first. And I didn't know this before, but the shuttle orbiters are the primary means of keeping the international space station in orbit- they connect the shuttle to the station and fire the shuttle boosters. That's one reason why shuttles are important I suppose, until the ISS gets its own propulsion systems.

While I was back, I decided to check out the old kung fu crew doing their new years shows. It was good seeing everyone's faces again. Man, everyone seems to have gotten better... or maybe my kung fu standards have been lowered from being out of the loop so long, hahaha. Well, let's hope it's the former. Yea, and somehow they managed to get Zhang Hui, the wushu wonder from New Mexico, to perform with them- her double straightsword was =O Hahah, yea, so I watched the crew do a big show at a supermarket this afternoon then a little show at Big Bowl in Frisco.

So yea, my dad & grandpa went to a dinner banquet... one of those big ol' Chinese commerce group things. I ate alone at home... but I had steak & lobster, so I guess it wasn't too bad, haha.

*So for the entire weekend, I collected a sum of $200 in cash... not too shabby. But half of it was supposedly an advance for my birthday.

"The crew of the shuttle Columbia did not return safely to Earth, but we can pray... they are safely home." ~George W. Bush

I was going to reflect a bit on the shuttle tragedy and my thoughts surrounding the space program, but I think I'll put it off for later...

F@%$! F*@#! F&@#! F*%^! F@#$! The space shuttle Columbia blew up this morning on re-entry. What a horrible death, being burned alive at 2000-3000F. I'm at a loss for words... Man, how unfortunate that this disaster should happen on Chinese New Year. =(